Inlay

Assistant professor @ Wageningen UR on #biodiversity #conservation in agricultural landscapes | #pollinators | #insects | #birds

📢 Peatland & PV – could do much better! Our new study in @springernature.com shows: Solar parks on drained peatlands emit more GHG than they save. 😱 🔗 Read the study: www.nature.com/articles/s41... Why? Drained peatlands release CO₂—offsetting clean energy gains.

MASSIVE BUMBLEBEE MIGRATION! Yesterday, bird migration hotspot Breskens, the Netherlands, counted ~1000 migrating bumblebee queens in a SINGLE HOUR (trektellen.nl/count/view/1...). More on this extraordinary phenomenon: besjournals.onlinelibrary.wiley.com/doi/10.1111/... @trektellen.bsky.social

Bee pollination increases fruit weight and antioxidants in pumpkins Pollination influences crop quality, especially the nutrient composition of fruits and seeds (micronutrients in our diet) #onehealth #health #micronutrients #pollinators #microhunger link.springer.com/article/10.1...

What are the reasons why people choose to protect pollinators like bees, butterflies and hoverflies? 🐝 🦋 A 2024 #SafeguardResearch examines the factors that influence the behaviour of people in rural and urban areas across 3 European countries. besjournals.onlinelibrary.wiley.com/doi/10.1002/...

This gallery of almost all EU bee species high quality photos is quite impressive: pollinatoracademy.eu/images

Mixed plant and arthropod biodiversity responses to solar park establishment on former agricultural lands 🦋 Suggests that, while biodiversity can increase in solar parks post-conversion compared to previous land use, not all taxonomic groups benefit from this change 🌏🧪 doi.org/10.1111/1365...

A welcome research comparing the results of pollinator monitoring obtained by humans (so-called 'pollination ecologists') and concurrent time-lapse videos (so-called 'the future for lazy' 😜). Take a quick glance at this figure from the paper and judge for yourself doi.org/10.1002/aps3...

Greifswald Mire Centre

Jeroen van der Sluijs

A new study in Science evaluating published data from 19 countries has pinpointed the minimum habitat levels needed to sustain pollinators in agricultural landscapes. https://scim.ag/3VIq4Cg

Journal of Applied Ecology

Due to the global decline of pollinators, global food security is at risk. Crops essentially dependent on pollinators such as pumpkin (Cucurbita moschata Duchesne, Cucurbitaceae) are the most affected. Although the importance of pollinators for crop productivity is known, there are many gaps in knowledge regarding the influence of pollination on crop quality, especially on the chemical composition of fruits and seeds. Here, we evaluated the relationship between floral display, frequency of visits and crop production, using three pumpkin plantations in the semi-arid region of NE Brazil as a model. In all sites we recorded floral display, floral visitors, and compared fruit set, fruit quality and seed number between natural (NP) and cross (CP) pollination experiments. Bees were the main pollinators, and Apis mellifera and Trigona spinipes were the most frequent. Floral display was positively correlated with the total number of visits, which had a positive relation with fruit weight, specifically because of T. spinipes visits. Visitation by A. mellifera had a negative relationship with pericarp length. Fruit set was about 9% higher in NP than in CP, whose fruits had lower antioxidant activity than the former. Floral display was positively related to the frequency of visits of pumpkin produced in the semi-arid region of northeastern Brazil. Bees were the main pollinators, especially T. spinipes and A. mellifera, which positively influenced fruit weight. Thus, pollinators favored fruit set, weight, and quality, in addition to promoting antioxidant potential.

The Pollinator Academy is a learning platform with integrated taxonomic tools and information on European pollinators.

pollinatoracademy.eu