Using a sentinel colony of Apis mellifera (Hymenoptera: Apidae) to assess pesticides and food sources.

Abstract

Honey bee populations are declining as occurs with other pollinators. One suggested cause of this decline is the impact of pesticides. To improve bees’ health, pesticides and food sources may be monitored using sentinel hives, given that bees forage in a 2.5 km radius around the hive. We extracted 20 (twenty) bees, as well as samples of wax, honey and pollen from a sentinel hive. Six pesticides were detected in the samples, except for the honey. All detected pesticides in the sentinel hive are pro- hibited in Argentina. Eight different plant families and genera were detected in the honey and pollen samples. Our work suggests that monitoring pesticides with sentinel beehives will be useful to improve agricultural practices in the region.