Neonicotinoids impact bumblebee colony fitness in the field; a reanalysis of the UK's Food & Environment Research Agency 2012 experiment.

Dave Goulson

doi:10.7717/peerj.854

Abstract

The causes of bee declines remain hotly debated, particularly the contribution of neonicotinoid insecticides. In 2013 the UK’s Food & Environment Research Agency made public a study of the impacts of exposure of bumblebee colonies to neonicotinoids. The study concluded that there was no clear relationship between colony performance and pesticide exposure, and the study was subsequently cited by the UK government in a policy paper in support of their vote against a proposed moratorium on some uses of neonicotinoids. Here I present a simple re-analysis of this data set. It demonstrates that these data in fact do show a negative relationship between both colony growth and queen production and the levels of neonicotinoids in the food stores collected by the bees. Indeed, this is the first study describing substantial negative impacts of neonicotinoids on colony performance of any bee species with free-flying bees in a field realistic situation where pesticide exposure is provided only as part of normal farming practices. It strongly suggests that wild bumblebee colonies in farmland can be expected to be adversely affected by exposure to neonicotinoids.

Highlights

Neonicotinoids are systemic neurotoxins, widely applied as seed dressings to arable crops, including those visited by bees, such as oilseed rape
100% of simulations were significant in explaining queen production i.e., there was always a significant, negative relationship between queen production and pesticide residue concentration
Despite the conclusions that were originally drawn by Food & Environment Research Agency (FERA), their data appear to provide the first clear evidence that colonies of free-flying bumblebees exposed to neonicotinoids used as part of normal farming practice suffer significant impacts in terms of reduced colony growth and queen production

Summary

Introduction

Neonicotinoids are systemic neurotoxins, widely applied as seed dressings to arable crops, including those visited by bees, such as oilseed rape. A number of high profile studies have been published in recent years, suggesting a link between bumblebee health and exposure to neonicotinoid insecticides (e.g., Laycock et al, 2012; Whitehorn et al, 2012; Gill, Ramos-Rodriguez & Raine, 2012; Feltham, Park & Goulson, 2014; Gill & Raine, 2014). Most of these studies can be criticised for not being representative of real, field situations since bees were forced to feed on pesticide-treated food, whereas in reality bees are free to choose where they forage.

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