Chemical miticides are used routinely in honey bee colonies worldwide as treatment for the parasitic mite Varroa destructor, but there have been very few long-term colony-level field studies of impacts on bees themselves. Lab-based with individual or small groups highlighted many negative effects behaviour and physiology; hence, is an urgent need to better understand consequences apicultural se...

Abstract: Since the last decade, unusually high honey bee colony losses have been reported mainly in North-America and Europe. Here, we report on a comprehensive bee pathogen screening in Belgium covering 363 bee colonies that were screened for 18 known disease-causing pathogens and correlate their incidence in summer with subsequent winter mortality. Our analyses demonstrate that in addition t...

The efÞcacy of a formic acid pad formulation was Þeld tested for control of the honey bee parasitic miteVarroa destructorAnderson & Trueman in Florida and Texas. This pad formulation gave 39.8 11.1% control at the end of a 6-wk treatment period,which did not signiÞcantly differ from the initial sample date. Coumaphos treatment provided poor control (38.4 11.1%) over the 6-wk period, conÞrming r...

Aggregations of 27 nm virus-like particles were observed in electron microscopy images of sectioned Varroa destructor mite tissue. The scattered occurrence of individual particles and accumulation of the virions in lattices in the cytoplasm gave an apparent indication that the virus replicates in the mite. Sequence analysis of the RNA of the purified virus revealed a genome organization with hi...

Freshwater biodiversity is globally threatened by various factors while severe weather events like long-term droughts may be substantially devastating. In order to remain in contact with the water or stay in a sufficiently humid environment at drying localities, the ability to withstand desiccation by dwelling in the hyporheic zone, particularly through vertical burrowing is crucial. We assesse...

The effectiveness of the Metarhizium anisopliae (Metschinkoff) Qu-M845 isolate was evaluated in laboratory and field trials. It was previously selected for thermal resistance (at 30 and 35 oC) and pathogenicity on Varroa destructor (Anderson and Trueman). In the laboratory, the first evaluations were carried out by spraying and increasing the concentration from zero to 108 conidia mL-1 on varro...

The unexplained collapse of honeybee (Apis mellifera) colonies across the world continues to fascinate both the scientific and mainstream media alike. This is mainly due to the worldwide importance of honeybees in ecological and commercial sectors. We recently reported how the ectoparasitic mite, Varroa destructor, altered the viral landscape in the Hawaiian archipelago by decreasing the viral ...