Foraging honey bee, honey and polle

Foraging honey bee, honey and pollen trap samples collected from eighteen apiaries in Western France (Bretagne and Pays de la Loire) from four different landscape contexts during four different periods in 2008 and in 2009 were analysed to evaluate the presence of pesticides and veterinary drug residues (Lambert et al. 2013). A multiresidue analysis was developed to identify and quantify 80 pesticides (covering the majority of active ingredients used for plant protection) and veterinary drugs in the three beehive matrices. A total of 141 honey bee, 141 honey and 128 pollen samples were collected from the 18 apiaries during 2008 and 2009. Of these, 102 (72.3 %), 135 (95.7 %) and 75 (58.6 %) of the samples, respectively, contained at least one of the defifined 80 chemicals. The frequency of detection was higher in the honey samples (28 compounds) than in the pollen (23 compounds) or honey bee (20 compounds) samples, but the highest concentrations were found in pollen. Although most compounds were rarely found, some of them reached high concentrations that might lead to adverse effects on bee health. The three most frequent residues in all three matrices were the widely used fungicide carbendazim and two acaricides, amitraz and coumaphos, that are used by beekeepers to control Varroa destructor. Clothianidin was not found at all while imidacloprid was only detected in 3 out of 141 honey samples (2.1 %) and in 1 of the 128 pollen samples (0.8 %) and was not found among the 141 honey bee samples. While it was recognised that lower levels established for this monitoring exercise could be present (e.g.,