A study recently published in the Journal of Environmental Research discovered that herbicide application and land use result in honey yield changes over time. Annual weather anomalies also played a part in these shifts.
The data came from several open-source databases, including those operated by the Department of Agriculture (USDA) National Agricultural Statistics Service and USDA Farm Service Agency. Other information included average honey yield per honey bee colony, land use, herbicide use, climate, weather anomalies, and soil productivity in the US.
Gabriela Quinlan, the lead author of the study and a National Science Foundation (NSF) postdoctoral research fellow in Penn State’s Department of Entomology and Center for Pollinator Research, said climate became increasingly connected to honey yields in the data after 1992.
Meanwhile, Christina Grozinger, a co-author of the paper, Publius Vergilius Maro Professor of Entomology, and director of the Center for Pollinator Research, said that flower availability affects honey production significantly.
The researchers also found that decreases in soybean land and increases in Conservation Reserve Program land, a national conservation program that supports pollinators, resulted in positive effects on honey yields.
Their findings provide valuable insights to improve models and design experiments to “enable beekeepers to predict honey yields, growers to understand pollination services, and land managers to support plant-pollinator communities and ecosystem services.”