Bee study looks at pesticide impact
22 Jun 10
Experts have launched a new study to see if pesticides are causing brain damage in bees.
Bees will be tagged with tiny radio frequency ID chips which will record their movements in and out of their hives.
Researchers will also weigh the insects to see how much food they have managed to carry back.
The aim is to determine if pesticides and other chemicals have affected bees' ability to forage for food, navigate, or perform the "waggle dance" which tells fellow insects the location, distance and direction of pollen and nectar sources.
The latest efforts form part of a series of studies, funded under the Living with Environmental Change programme, looking at the decline in the population of insects such as bees, hoverflies, butterflies and moths, which are worth an estimated £440 million to the economy as crop pollinators.
Experts said three of the UK's 25 bumblebee species had gone extinct, while half had suffered declines of up to 70%.
Three quarters of butterfly species were declining, while there was little "robust science" on what was happening to other insect pollinators such as hoverflies, the researchers said.
Copyright © Press Association 2010
http://www.nerc.ac.uk/research/programmes/lwec/ (Living with Environmental Change)
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