Bees provide essential pollination services to natural and agricultural areas in the United States (US) that have been valued at $50 billion per year (Bauer and Sue Wing 2016; Jordan et al. 2021). These pollination services are provided through complementarity between managed and wild bees that handle crop flowers in different ways to maximize pollination and yield (Isaacs et al. 2017; Garibaldi et al. 2013). As part of the pollination systems in the US, about 2 million managed honey bee colonies are rented and used for the pollination of over 100 fruit, vegetable, and fiber crops each year. Thus, both beekeepers and growers of pollination-dependent crops need science-based information that can support healthier managed and wild pollinators. 

Efficient delivery of managed pollination services is therefore critical for the sustainability of agricultural systems but is also threatened by the poor state of US honey bees and the decline in wild bee populations. Since the mid-2000s, beekeepers have consistently experienced annual colony losses of 31-46% (Vanengelsdorp et al. 2007; Lee et al. 2015; Bruckner et al. 2023; Steinhauer et al. 2014; vanEngelsdorp and Hayes 2011; Spleen et al. 2013). While beekeepers can often make up for these losses through intensive management of surviving colonies, current management tools are costly and may not be sufficient to indefinitely sustain the honey bee colony numbers needed for crop pollination (Aizen and Harder 2009; Aizen, Garibaldi, and Harder 2022). Other pollinators such as mason bees and unmanaged wild pollinators also contribute substantially to agricultural pollination in many crops (Garibaldi et al. 2013; Koh et al. 2018). Unfortunately, the long-term health and abundance of wild pollinators are also under threat (Koh et al. 2016; Turley et al. 2022) and there is an increasing need to monitor populations of wild pollinators to detect declines and develop management, conservation, and restoration action plans (Woodard, Federman, and James 2020).

The proposed objectives of this multi-state project align with the research priorities identified by the USDA—developed through a collective consensus of needs and priorities obtained from 15 federal agencies—that include the following five subject matter areas for research: (1) status and trends of pollinator populations; (2) forage, habitat, and nutrition; (3) environmental stressors, (4) pest and pathogens; and (5) genetics and breeding (USDA Annual Strategic Pollinator Priorities Report 2022). The role of scientists from Land-Grant universities and their extension system is critical in contributing to these research priorities for the development of science-based information that can directly inform the needs of stakeholders about pollinator abundance and diversity, their health status, and what practices can improve their health and pollination services.      

The causes of honey bee and wild pollinator declines in the US are varied, complex, and defy a simplistic explanation, as multiple stressors are almost certainly involved (LeBuhn and Vargas Luna 2021). Ongoing changes in the predictability of climate and increases in the frequency of extreme weather events are exacerbating several of these stressors (Harvey et al. 2023). Participants of this project include many of the leaders and pioneers of research in the field of pollinator health. Members of the NC1173 multi-state project have made significant progress in identifying a mechanistic understanding of how stressors impact bee health at the individual, colony, and population levels (López-Uribe, Ricigliano, and Simone-Finstrom 2020). While advances are being made in many key research areas related to pollinator health, a real solution to managed and wild pollinator health problems needs a combined broad approach that integrates diverse expertise and members from geographically widespread areas. As such, the collaborative work fostered by the NC1173 multi-state research project is critical to building a holistic understanding of the status and health problems of managed and wild pollinators. In our previous multi-state project, over 240 peer-reviewed papers were published (Table 1), and over 100+ extension publications and events were hosted. These research outputs have significantly advanced our understanding of the underlying stress responses of pollinators to environmental changes while contributing to science-based information needed for the implementation of mitigation approaches to these problems,

Many of the findings from these large collaborative and multistate projects have been presented and synthesized at national and international meetings including the American Bee Research Conference (ABRC), the Entomological Society of America (ESA), and the USDA/EPA State of the Science Conference. These research efforts and presentations at conferences have provided a roadmap for the research priority areas that are listed in the USDA Annual Strategic Pollinator Priorities Report. The newly proposed NC1173 multi-state project will continue to work on this critical research while expanding our scope to include climate change research and wild bee monitoring efforts.

There is a clear need defined by stakeholders to mitigate the continued honey bee losses and the decline of wild bees. The consequences of inaction will further destabilize the food-production system, decrease yields and quality of fruit and vegetable production, and potentially increase produce prices. The technical feasibility of the proposed working group is greatly facilitated by the participation of nationally renowned scientists in this project, as well as the existing practice of adjoining the American Bee Research Conference (ABRC) with the largest national apiculture associations in the US: the American Beekeeping Federation (ABF). These meetings are also attended by members of the two largest honey bee associations: the American Honey Producers of America (AHPA) and the Apiary Inspectors of America (AIA). The International Conference on Pollinator Biology, Health and Policy is also attended by several key stakeholder groups including the Xerces Society for Invertebrate Conservation, representatives from the pesticide industry, and the Food and Agriculture Organization (FAO). This tradition of interfacing with stakeholders and other professional groups involved in managed and wild bee management is ideally suited to collaboration, interaction, and discussion of current and emerging issues regarding pollinator health. Thus, there is a clear advantage of fostering this multi-state effort, because the threats to pollinator health are likely context-dependent, and solutions to these problems require geographically specific research and coordinated efforts to synthesize findings and develop action plans. The impacts from our ongoing interactions with stakeholders and research efforts have been significant (see above), and therefore, a continuation of the NC1173 working group will advance these successes going forward.