Bijensterfte, oorzaken en gevolgen

International Bee Research Association Press Release 1 February 2012
Since 2006 there has been concern worldwide about losses of honey bee colonies, especially the phenomenon of “Colony Collapse Disorder” in the USA. Information about the extent of these losses has,to date, been patchy, unsystematic and difficult to compare year on year and from country to country. Today, for the first time, the results of systematic surveys in Europe, north America, China, Israel and Turkey are published together in the Journal of Apicultural Research.

Current Biology, Volume 21, Issue 17, 13 September, 2011
The spread of herbicide-resistant weeds, progress in genomics, climate change and the continuing worries about pollinator decline are forcing companies to rethink their approach to crop protection. Michael Gross reports.

Wilde bijenspecialist Dr. Arie Koster ontwikkelde een website met overzichtelijke zoekkaarten waarmee je zelf eenvoudig wilde bijen kunt herkennen. De zoekkaart voor wilde bijen geeft een overzicht van bijengeslachten. Bij ieder bijengeslacht is er een link naar meer informatie.

ABSTRACT: The contribution of nutrients from animal pollinated world crops has not previously been evaluated as a biophysical measure for the value of pollination services. This study evaluates the nutritional composition of animal-pollinated world crops. We calculated pollinator dependent and independent proportions of different nutrients of world crops, employing FAO data for crop production, USDA data for nutritional composition, and pollinator dependency data according to Klein et al. (2007). Crop plants that depend fully or partially on animal pollinators contain more than 90% of vitamin C, the whole quantity of Lycopene and almost the full quantity of the antioxidants β-cryptoxanthin and β-tocopherol, the majority of the lipid, vitamin A and related carotenoids, calcium and fluoride, and a large portion of folic acid. Ongoing pollinator decline may thus exacerbate current difficulties of providing a nutritionally adequate diet for the global human population.

In opdracht van het Ministerie van LNV voerden EIS-Nederland en Alterra in 2010 een onderzoek uit naar wilde bestuivende insecten in appel- en perenboomgaarden in de Betuwe tussen Zaltbommel en Echteld.

In het kader van het BIJ1 onderzoeksproject heeft Alterra een tussenrapportage uitgebracht over de achteruitgang van wilde bestuivers. In dit onderzoek is aan de hand van bloembezoek gegevens de relevantie van wilde bijen voor de bestuiving van gewassen in de Nederlandse landbouw onderzocht. Gebleken is dat het merendeel van de Nederlandse wilde bijensoorten relevant kan worden geacht voor de bestuiving van landbouwgewassen.

J. Scheper, M. Reemer en D. Kleijn, 2011, tussenrapportage aanpak achteruitgang wilde bestuivers (BIJ-1)

Researchers from the University of Reading have shown that wild bees are the unsung heroes for our food security and not honeybees as previously thought.

Despite widespread concern about declines in pollination services, little is known about the patterns of change in most pollinator assemblages. By studying bee and hoverfly assemblages in Britain and the Netherlands, we found evidence of declines (pre-versus post-1980) in local bee diversity in both countries; however, divergent trends were observed in hoverflies. Depending on the assemblage and location, pollinator declines were most frequent in habitat and flower specialists, in univoltine species, and/or in nonmigrants. In conjunction with this evidence, outcrossing plant species that are reliant on the declining pollinators have themselves declined relative to other plant species. Taken together, these findings strongly suggest a causal connection between local extinctions of functionally linked plant and pollinator species.

On organic farms near natural habitat, we found that native bee communities could provide full pollination services even for a crop with heavy pollination requirements (e.g., watermelon, Citrullus lanatus), without the intervention of managed honey bees. All other farms, however, experienced greatly reduced diversity and abundance of native bees, resulting in insufficient pollination services from native bees alone. We found that diversity was essential for sustaining the service, because of year-to-year variation in community composition. Continued degradation of the agro-natural landscape will destroy this “free” service, but conservation and restoration of bee habitat are potentially viable economic alternatives for reducing dependence on managed honey bees.

Numerous studies from Europe and the US have documented recent declines in many species of bumble bees, and such declines were often observed in areas where anthropogenic changes in habitat have occurred, such as agricultural intensification and urbanisation. Attempts to conserve bumble bees should involve wildlife-friendly approaches to agriculture, such as increasing agricultural land set-asides and hedgerows, and employing integrated pest management.

De toestand van de dagvlinders in de provincie Antwerpen is verre van rooskleurig: een vrij groot deel van de oorspronkelijk aanwezige soorten is verdwenen en van het resterende deel is ook een groot aantal in meer of mindere mate bedreigd. Deze toestand is niet beperkt tot de provincie Antwerpen maar is vergelijkbaar met heel Vlaanderen, Nederland en Wallonië. Ook libellen en waterjuffers worden in de Benelux met uitsterven bedreigd.

In het Juni 2009 nummer van het Franse INRA magazine (L'Institut National de la Recherche Agronomique) staat een artikel "Le déclin des abeilles, un casse-tête pour la reche; dossier central". Zie:
www.inra.fr/content/download/16788/277180/version/2/file/inra-magazine-9.pdf.

Meer dan twintigduizend verschillende bijensoorten zorgen wereldwijd dat 80% van alle plantensoorten zich voort kunnen planten en evolueren.

Bron: Vaissière, B.E., Morison, N. and Carré, G., 2005. Abeilles, pollinisation et biodiversité. Abeilles et cie, 3(106), pp. 10 - 14.
(Tip: als deze link een pdf fout geeft, dan met de rechtermuisknop link opslaan als.. kiezen en daarna van harde schijf openen)

Zie ook deze boeken:

Bestuivers zijn onmisbaar voor 35% van de wereld voedsel en veevoerproductie.

Honey bees vital for agricultural industry
Sue Kedgley, New Zealand Herald 4 May 2009

New Zealand is slowly waking up to the realisation that honey bees are indispensable to our agriculture, horticulture, environment and economy.