The Irish Apicultural Programme:
​Investigating the impact of multiple stressors on honey bees

By: Dr. Darren O'Connell

Darren spoke to us about his research into disease and pesticides in honey and bees. His fascinating talk contained some rather concerning discoveries, particularly that PCR tests showed the presence of AFB and EFB in many hives, even though there were absolutely no clinical symptoms.  This emphasises the need to send off samples to Dr. Coffey twice a year - it's free so why not do it? 

He also mentioned two diseases that were unknown to most people:

• Lotmaria passim is a trypanosomatid (nematode) gut parasite of the honeybee and is the most common infection in Ireland. Unfortunately little is known about its effects on the bees, although it appears to shorten its lifespan.
• Crithidia mellificae is another trypanosomatid gut parasite. However it is nowadays thankfully rare.

There was a lively Q&A session after his talk and clearly it's a subject many are interested in.