![]() ![]() ![]() Controlling for parasitic mites is time consuming and costly with damage control estimated in the billions of dollars worldwide. Probably because of this, beekeepers in the United States rank parasites as a bigger threat to their honey bee colonies than CCD. Varroa destructor is widespread in honey bee hives, affecting every life stage of honey bees from larva to adult. Infections from agents within any of these pathogen and parasite groups can be fatal to honey bees, but the parasitic Varroa destructor mite appears to be the most harmful to colonies overall. Honey bees suffer from numerous parasites and pathogens including viruses, bacteria, parasitic fungi and ectoparasitic mites. While viral and microsporidian infections have been linked to increased mortality and declining health in honey bee colonies, , studies have not directly addressed behavioral changes involved in abandonment of hives. So far, the main causal suspects have been parasitic mites, fungal parasites, viral diseases and interactions amongst them –. Although catastrophic losses of honey bee colonies have occurred in the past, the magnitude and speed of recent hive losses appear unprecedented. At the same time, some regions of Europe and Asia have reported only normal colony losses. While the United States is the only country for which CCD sensu stricto has been documented, there also has been an increase in unexplained colony losses for some regions of Europe and other parts of the world –. In the United States, Colony Collapse Disorder (CCD), a syndrome characterized by loss of hives and the behavior of hive abandonment, threatens honey bee colonies and has received considerable scientific and media attention. The honey bee Apis mellifera has experienced recent unexplained die-offs around the world. The funders had no role in study design, data collection and analysis, decision to publish, or preparation of the manuscript.Ĭompeting interests: The authors have declared that no competing interests exist. JH and CS were supported by a California State University Program for Education and Research in Biotechnology Faculty-Student Seed Research grant. CR was supported by a Genetech Graduate Student Fellowship and Project Apis m. JD was supported by the Howard Hughes Medical Institute. This is an open-access article distributed under the terms of the Creative Commons Attribution License, which permits unrestricted use, distribution, and reproduction in any medium, provided the original author and source are credited.įunding: United States National Science Foundation grant DEB-1025922 supported BB. Received: Accepted: DecemPublished: January 3, 2012Ĭopyright: © 2012 Core et al. Raine, Royal Holloway University of London, United Kingdom (2012) A New Threat to Honey Bees, the Parasitic Phorid Fly Apocephalus borealis. Understanding details of phorid infection may shed light on similar hive abandonment behaviors seen in CCD.Ĭitation: Core A, Runckel C, Ivers J, Quock C, Siapno T, DeNault S, et al. Phorid parasitism may affect hive viability since 77% of sites sampled in the San Francisco Bay Area were infected by the fly and microarray analyses detected phorids in commercial hives in South Dakota and California's Central Valley. Larvae and adult phorids also tested positive for these pathogens, implicating the fly as a potential vector or reservoir of these honey bee pathogens. Microarray analyses of honey bees from infected hives revealed that these bees are often infected with deformed wing virus and Nosema ceranae. Using DNA barcoding, we confirmed that phorids that emerged from honey bees and bumble bees were the same species. On average, seven days later up to 13 phorid larvae emerge from each dead bee and pupate away from the bee. Parasitized honey bees show hive abandonment behavior, leaving their hives at night and dying shortly thereafter. Here we provide the first documentation that the phorid fly Apocephalus borealis, previously known to parasitize bumble bees, also infects and eventually kills honey bees and may pose an emerging threat to North American apiculture. Interaction among multiple pathogens and parasites is the proposed cause for Colony Collapse Disorder (CCD), a syndrome characterized by worker bees abandoning their hive. Honey bee colonies are subject to numerous pathogens and parasites. ![]()
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