Consumers often believe that “natural food” is harmless, however naturally occurring toxins in food represent a health risk to humans. Honey as a natural, nutritious sweetener, is one of the most commonly consumed foods throughout the world. However, food safety concerns for honey arise when honeybees collect nectar from poisonous plants such as Rhododendron sp., Coriaria arborea, and Tripterygium wilfordii Hook…
Bee venom (BV) is a typical toxin secreted by stingers of honeybee workers. BV and BV therapy have long been attractive to different cultures, with extensive studies during recent decades. Nowadays, BV is applied to combat several skin diseases, such as atopic dermatitis, acne vulgaris, alopecia, vitiligo, and psoriasis. BV is used extensively in topical…
As part of the MUST‐B project, a research project on field data collection for honey bee colony model evaluation was carried out in 2018‐2020. In a preparatory phase (2018), methods for monitoring of honey bee colonies were tested, field operators trained, and experimental colonies established. The main field experiment was conducted in 2019‐2020, during which…
Microplastics (MPs) are ubiquitous and persistent pollutants, and have been detected in a wide variety of media, from soils to aquatic systems. MPs, consisting primarily of polyethylene, polypropylene, and polyacrylamide polymers, have recently been found in 12% of samples of honey collected in Ecuador. Recently, MPs have also been identified in honey bees collected from…
Abstract Bees are essential pollinators and their protection is relevant to secure biodiversity and agricultural production. MonViA-project members and partners collaborate in monitoring projects to develop effective policies to support biodiversity in Germany. In the current case-study, the impact of climate on honey bee population performance was assessed. We modeled year-to-year Central-European honey yield changes…
Red clover (Trifolium pratense L.) is an important forage legume grown in many of the temperate regions around the world. In order to evaluate possible causes for the low seed yield in particular in tetraploid red clover, we surveyed 71 studies of red clover seed production published from 1948 to 2019, reviewing seed yield components,…