Home sick: impacts of migratory

beekeeping on honey bee (Apis mellifera)

pests, pathogens, and colony size
Samantha A. Alger1 , P. Alexander Burnham1 , Zachary S. Lamas2 ,
Alison K. Brody1 and Leif L. Richardson3 ,4
1
Department of Biology, University of Vermont, Burlington, VT, United States of America
2
Department of Entomology, University of Maryland, College Park, MD, United States of America
3
Rubenstein School of Environment and Natural Resources, University of Vermont, Burlington, VT,
United States of America
4
Gund Institute for Environment, University of Vermont, Burlington, VT, United States of America

ABSTRACT
Honey bees are important pollinators of agricultural crops and the dramatic losses of
honey bee colonies have risen to a level of international concern. Potential contributors
to such losses include pesticide exposure, lack of floral resources and parasites and
pathogens. The damaging effects of all of these may be exacerbated by apicultural
practices. To meet the pollination demand of US crops, bees are transported to areas
of high pollination demand throughout the year. Compared to stationary colonies, risk
of parasitism and infectious disease may be greater for migratory bees than those that
remain in a single location, although this has not been experimentally established. Here,
we conducted a manipulative experiment to test whether viral pathogen and parasite
loads increase as a result of colonies being transported for pollination of a major US
crop, California almonds. We also tested if they subsequently transmit those diseases to
stationary colonies upon return to their home apiaries. Colonies started with equivalent
numbers of bees, however migratory colonies returned with fewer bees compared to
stationary colonies and this difference remained one month later. Migratory colonies
returned with higher black queen cell virus loads than stationary colonies, but loads
were similar between groups one month later. Colonies exposed to migratory bees
Submitted 3 May 2018 experienced a greater increase of deformed wing virus prevalence and load compared
Accepted 23 September 2018
Published 2 November 2018 to the isolated group. The three groups had similar infestations of Varroa mites upon
return of the migratory colonies. However, one month later, mite loads in migratory
Corresponding author
Samantha A. Alger, salger@uvm.edu colonies were significantly lower compared to the other groups, possibly because of
lower number of host bees. Our study demonstrates that migratory pollination practices
Academic editor
Joseph Gillespie has varying health effects for honey bee colonies. Further research is necessary to
clarify how migratory pollination practices influence the disease dynamics of honey
Additional Information and
Declarations can be found on bee diseases we describe here.
page 15
DOI 10.7717/peerj.5812 Subjects Agricultural Science, Ecology, Entomology, Parasitology
Copyright Keywords Beekeeping, Honey bee, Pathogen, Disease, Migratory, Pollination, Agriculture,
2018 Alger et al. Migratory beekeeping, Apis mellifera

Distributed under
Creative Commons CC-BY 4.0

OPEN ACCESS

How to cite this article Alger et al. (2018), Home sick: impacts of migratory beekeeping on honey bee (Apis mellifera) pests, pathogens,
and colony size. PeerJ 6:e5812; DOI 10.7717/peerj.5812
 INTRODUCTION
Animal-mediated pollination, provided primarily by bees, is required for the production of
75% of agricultural food crops (Klein et al., 2007) and provides an estimated annual value
of $200 billion worldwide (Gallai et al., 2009). Managed honey bees (Apis mellifera) are
the most important commercially available pollinator and contribute approximately $17
billion in pollination services revenue annually to the United States (US) alone (Calderone,
2012). However, for over a decade, honey bees have experienced elevated colony losses
(Neumann & Carreck, 2010; Potts et al., 2010; Van der Zee et al., 2012; Van der Zee et al.,
2013; Kulhanek et al., 2017) attributed to multiple threats including pesticide exposure
(Tsvetkov et al., 2017; Woodcock et al., 2017), forage availability (Decourtye, Mader &
Desneux, 2010), and numerous pests and pathogens (VanEngelsdorp & Meixner, 2010).
The numerous threats affecting honeybees may be exacerbated by practices inherent to the
apicultural industry and required for large-scale crop pollination, specifically migratory
beekeeping (Royce & Rossignol, 1990; Traynor et al., 2016a).
To meet the pollination demand of a variety of US agricultural crops, large numbers
of bees are moved among crops at regional and national scales. Conditions for migratory
colonies vary greatly depending on the distance traveled and the crops visited. In the most
extreme cases, colonies are transported by truck to a series of monoculture crops including
blueberries, cranberries, almonds, and citrus (VanEngelsdorp et al., 2013) for months at a
time. At each stop along the journey, millions of bees from different origins converge on
a single crop for the duration of bloom, which typically lasts approximately one month
and may offer little forage diversity (Decourtye, Mader & Desneux, 2010; Colwell et al.,
2017). Nectar, comprised of sugars and amino acids, is required to fuel flight and feed the
colony while pollen, high in protein and fats, provisions developing brood (Brodschneider &
Crailsheim, 2010). To ensure survival en route or when crops are not in bloom, colonies may
be supplemented with sucrose syrup and artificial pollen, temporary but poor substitutes
for the diverse array of nectar and pollen types bees obtain in natural landscapes (Huang,
2012). Thus, compared to their stationary counterparts, migratory colonies experience
greater stress (Simone-Finstrom et al., 2016), greater exposure to pesticides (Mullin et
al., 2010; Traynor et al., 2016a), and lower quality forage (Brodschneider & Crailsheim,
2010; Decourtye, Mader & Desneux, 2010; Colwell et al., 2017), all of which may increase
susceptibility to disease (Di Pasquale et al., 2013; Sánchez-Bayo et al., 2016). It is well known
that stress from long distance travel results in heightened bacterial and viral infections
in vertebrate livestock (Yates, 1982). However, despite the importance of large-scale
pollination events for agriculture, few studies have examined how migratory conditions
may contribute to disease incidence in bees (Welch et al., 2009; Zhu, Zhou & Huang, 2014;
Traynor et al., 2016b).
In the US, there are an estimated 2.62 million commercial honey bee colonies of
which over half are contracted for crop pollination (USDA National Agricultural Statistics
Service, 2017b). California almond pollination is the largest annual event for the migratory
beekeeping industry, requiring over 1.5 million honey bee colonies (USDA National
Agricultural Statistics Service, 2017a). It is the largest convergence of honey bee colonies in

Alger et al. (2018), PeerJ, DOI 10.7717/peerj.5812 2/22

 the US, providing conditions in which pathogens are likely to be introduced, transmitted,
and subsequently spread as colonies move along their human-imposed migration route
(Bakonyi et al., 2002; Welch et al., 2009; Runckel et al., 2011; Goulson et al., 2015). Each acre
of almonds requires an average of two honey bee colonies (Carman, 2011) and as bees
will forage 3 km from their colonies (Visscher & Seeley, 1982; Beekman & Ratnieks, 2000;
Couvillon et al., 2015), bees in large orchards could theoretically share flowers with bees
from nearly 56,000 other colonies. While almond flowers may produce a large quantity
of nectar and pollen, there is evidence that it is relatively low quality (and possibly toxic)
forage for honey bees (London-Shafir, Shafir & Eisikowitch, 2003; Kevan & Ebert, 2005);
moreover, the vast fields provide little forage diversity for bees and are heavily sprayed with
pesticides (California Department of Pesticide Regulation, 2016), exposing bees to additional
stress.
The spread of the most devastating honey bee parasites and pathogens has mainly
occurred as a result of transporting honey bees long distances. For example, the Varroa
mite (Varroa destructor), an ectoparasite and known vector of numerous RNA viruses,
became a major contributor to colony losses in both North America and Europe after
its introduction from Asia (Rosenkranz, Aumeier & Ziegelmann, 2010; Nazzi et al., 2012).
Nosema ceranae, a microsporidian implicated in high colony mortality in Spain (Higes
et al., 2008), has also reached high frequencies since its introduction from Asia to the
Americas and Europe (Klee et al., 2007; Chen et al., 2008). Despite the role of long-distance
travel in disease spread, there is a surprising lack of studies examining the role of migratory
beekeeping in disease spread.
A limited number of observational surveys have compared disease loads of colonies
belonging to migratory and stationary operations and found a higher prevalence of some
pathogens in migratory colonies (Traynor et al., 2016b) including Nosema ceranae (Zhu,
Zhou & Huang, 2014) and RNA viruses (Welch et al., 2009), some of which were not
previously described in honey bees (Runckel et al., 2011). However, the focus of previous
studies has been the collection of baseline disease data to characterize diseases in migratory
colonies and, as such, rarely control for migratory conditions, management practices, and
sampling times, all of which can significantly affect disease loads and colony health (Runckel
et al., 2011; Glenny et al., 2017). Furthermore, studies examining the impact of migratory
conditions on bees rarely include a control group of stationary colonies for comparison
(but see Zhu, Zhou & Huang, 2014; Simone-Finstrom et al., 2016). Although migratory
honey bee colonies are implicated as disease sources and could serve to introduce disease to
local stationary honey bee colonies (Welch et al., 2009) we are unaware of previous studies
that explicitly test the role of migratory colonies in the spread of diseases or parasites.
Here, we conducted a two-pronged experiment in which we controlled for migratory
conditions, sampling time, and beekeeper management practices. We first tested the
effects of migration on honey bee colony population size, Varroa mite parasites, and
pathogens including Nosema (a microsporidian) and three RNA viruses: black queen cell
virus (BQCV), deformed wing virus (DWV), and Israeli acute paralysis virus (IAPV). We
examined differences in the parasite and pathogen prevalence and load as well as colony
size of migratory and stationary colonies. Second, we examined if there is evidence for

Alger et al. (2018), PeerJ, DOI 10.7717/peerj.5812 3/22

 the transmission of diseases from migratory colonies to stationary colonies. If migration
exposes bees to stressors that increase disease susceptibility, we predicted that migratory
colonies would have greater pathogen prevalence and loads when compared to their
stationary counterparts, and that pathogen loads in sympatric stationary colonies would
increase after foraging alongside the migratory colonies for one month.

MATERIALS AND METHODS

In February 2017, we selected 48 colonies from a North Carolina apiary that is used
for the production of products (honey, colonies, etc.) rather than pollination services,
and assigned each to one of the following groups: migratory (n = 16), isolated stationary
(isolated) (n = 16), and exposed stationary (exposed) (n = 16; Fig. 1). We transported
colonies in the migratory group from Whiteville (Columbus County), North Carolina
to Coalinga (Fresno County), California (36◦ 210 N, 120◦ 120 W) to pollinate almonds for
the duration of the bloom (approximately one month). They were then transported back
to North Carolina. As typical of migratory beekeeping practices, the migratory colonies
were covered by netting during transport (to reduce escapees) and temporarily brought
to a nearby holding yard in California before and after pollinating almond orchards. The
isolated stationary group remained in North Carolina (34◦ 220 N, 78◦ 360 W) and outside the
flight distance from returning migratory colonies for the entirety of the experiment. To
maintain similar colony densities at the isolated stationary and migratory yards, there were
an additional 15 stationary colonies in the isolated yard. These colonies originated from
the same North Carolina apiary and were not tested as part of the experiment.
At the start of the experiment in February 2017, all colonies had 7–9 frames of bees, and
7–8 frames with brood. To measure bee population size, we counted frames of adult bees
(FOB) by assessing the coverage of adult bees on each frame and summing the estimates
for all frames in the brood chamber (the lower hive body containing the queen and brood)
(DeGrandi-Hoffman et al., 2016). Frames with brood were assessed by counting the total
number of frames containing 30% capped brood. Each colony was provided a new queen
by replacement with open-mated Italian (A. mellifera ligustica)/ Carniolan (A. mellifera
carnica) queens in summer 2016. Colonies were matched in triplicate by frames of bees and
frames of brood and randomly assigned a treatment group (migratory, isolated stationary,
or exposed stationary) to ensure equal distribution across groups. Prior to the start of the
experiment, in October 2016, we treated all colonies for Varroa mites with fluvalinate,
a synthetic pyrethroid commonly used as an acaricide in honey bee colonies. No other
mite or pathogen treatments were used for the duration of the experiment. To ensure
that colonies would persist for the duration of the experiment, we provided supplemental
feed to all colonies (in all treatment groups) on two occasions: pollen substitute prior to
shipping the migratory colonies to California and upon return, 5 lbs. of fondant (sucrose
and water stabilized with gelatin). As colonies grew during the duration of the study,
additional hive bodies were added as needed to prevent swarming.
We compared bee population size and disease loads in the migratory and isolated
stationary group three times: before the migratory group departed for California (Jan.

Alger et al. (2018), PeerJ, DOI 10.7717/peerj.5812 4/22

 Figure 1 Schematic of experimental design. Three sampling events occurred during the experiment.
Three experimental groups (isolated stationary group, migratory group, and exposed group) were located
in two separate apiaries in North Carolina throughout the experiment: the stationary yard (where all
groups begin and the isolated stationary group remained for the duration of the experiment) and the
exposed yard (where the exposed group was exposed to the migratory group). Dotted arrows show
movement of colonies throughout the experiment. Between sampling events one and two, the migratory
colonies were transported to California for almond pollination and back. Exposed colonies began in the
stationary yard and were transferred to the exposed yard prior to sampling event two. Geographic distance
between yards are specified in kilometers.
Full-size DOI: 10.7717/peerj.5812/fig-1

25), immediately after the migratory group returned to North Carolina from California
(Feb. 28), and one month later (March 25). To test for disease spread from the migratory
colonies to their stationary counterparts, we monitored the third group of colonies, the
exposed stationary group, which remained in North Carolina but shared a yard with the
migratory colonies once they returned from California (34◦ 110 N, 78◦ 460 W). We assessed
bee population size and disease loads in the exposed stationary group twice: once before
sharing a yard with the migratory group (Feb. 28), and again approximately one month after
residing with the migratory colonies in the same yard (March 25). Land cover surrounding
each of the North Carolina yarding areas were dominated by crops, mixed forest, and
woody wetlands, and we expect that colonies in the two sites had similar access to early
spring floral resources. Hives were housed on private land and permission was granted by
the owners.
At each sampling event, we inspected all colonies for brood diseases, measured colony
size, and collected bees for pathogen analyses. To estimate colony size, we measured frames
of bees (FOB) as before (DeGrandi-Hoffman et al., 2016). We also recorded the queen status
of each colony (queen-right, queenless, queen cells present, or drone-laying queen). We
collected live bees from the brood chamber to detect and quantify the following parasites
and pathogens: Varroa, Nosema, BQCV, DWV, and IAPV. To quantify Varroa and Nosema
spp., we collected approximately 300 bees from the brood chamber and transferred them

Alger et al. (2018), PeerJ, DOI 10.7717/peerj.5812 5/22

 to ethanol. To quantify virus prevalence and load, we collected an additional 150 bees from
the brood chamber. These samples were stored and shipped to Vermont on dry ice and
transferred to −80 ◦ C for storage prior to analysis.
To examine differences in climate and weather conditions experienced by the migratory
and stationary groups, we used publicly available NOAA local climatology data collected
by weather stations nearest to our field sites (NOAA National Centers for Environmental
Information) (Table S1).

Varroa mite and Nosema spp. quantification

To calculate the number of Varroa mites per 100 bees, ethanol samples were agitated for
60 s, strained through hardware cloth to separate the mites from the bees, and all mites and
bees were counted (Lee et al., 2010). We conducted spore counts to quantify Nosema spp.
Although our methods did not differentiate between the two species of Nosema, (N. apis
and N. ceranae) previous work has found N. ceranae to be the predominant species in many
regions (Klee et al., 2007; Chen et al., 2008; Williams et al., 2008; Williams et al., 2014). To
conduct spore counts, we transferred 100 bees from the ethanol sample to a plastic bag and
pulverized them using a pestle on the outside of the bag for 90 s. We then added 100 mL of
distilled water, allowed it to settle for 45 s, and transferred 10 µL onto a haemocytometer
counting chamber. We counted spores for each sample twice under 40× magnification,
averaged them, and converted to spores/bee (Fries et al., 2013).

Virus quantification
To quantify BQCV, DWV and IAPV, we transferred 50 honey bees/sample on liquid
nitrogen and homogenized them in an extraction bag with 10 mL of GITC buffer using
protocols established by USDA-ARS Bee Research Lab Beltsville, MD (Evans, 2006). We
followed EZNA Plant RNA Standard Protocols (Omega Bio-Tek, Norcross, GA, USA) with
100 µL of the resulting homogenate thereafter. Using a spectrometer (NanoDrop; Thermo
Scientific, Waltham, MA, USA), we assessed all RNA quantity and quality and diluted all
RNA extractions to 20 ng/µL prior to virus assays.
For reverse transcription of RNA and absolute quantification, we performed duplicate
reverse transcription quantitative polymerase chain reaction (RT-qPCR) for each sample
with a SYBR green one-step RT-qPCR kit in 10 µL reactions using the following thermal
cycling program: 10 min at 50 ◦ C (RT) followed by 1 min at 95 ◦ C, and 40 amplification
cycles of 95 ◦ C for 15 s, 60 ◦ C for 60 s. Lastly, we obtained the melt-curve starting at
65–95 ◦ C (0.5 ◦ C increments, each 2 s). We used primers specific to the positive strand of
the following RNA virus targets: BQCV, DWV and IAPV, and a housekeeping gene (Actin)
as a positive control of RNA extraction efficiency (Table S2). We calculated quantification
using duplicate standard curves of gBlocks Gene Fragments (Integrated DNA Technologies;
Data S1) that were developed using double-stranded, sequence verified genomic blocks
consisting of the four targets of interest separated by ten random base pairs. Sequences
of random base pairs consisting of at least 50% G and Cs were used at the beginning and
terminal ends of the fragment. Efficiencies were 95.21% (BQCV), 91.06% (DWV), 90.27%
(IAPV), and 90.12% (Actin), with correlation coefficients (R2 ) ranging from 0.993–0.999.

Alger et al. (2018), PeerJ, DOI 10.7717/peerj.5812 6/22

 To verify RT-PCR analyses, sequences with lengths of 100–130 bps were generated through
DNA sequencing performed in the Vermont Integrative Genomics Resource using a 3130xl
Genetic Analyzer.

Data reporting
We use ‘‘pathogen prevalence’’ to refer to the percentage of colonies positive for a pathogen
(Varroa, Nosema, BQCV and DWV). In addition to presence/absence data, we investigated
the severity of infection by quantifying each pathogen—we refer to this as ‘‘pathogen
load’’. Virus load (BQCV and DWV) results for each colony are presented in average
virus genome copies/bee. We did not detect IAPV in our experimental colonies and it was
therefore excluded from further analysis. We report Varroa as the number of mites per 100
bees and Nosema as average number of spores/bee.

Data analysis and statistics

Before analyzing, we checked all response variables for normality using Shapiro–Wilk
tests. To improve normality, Varroa and Nosema loads as well as BQCV and DWV loads
(genome copies per bee) were log + 1 transformed. To establish that there were no
differences between treatment groups at the outset, we analyzed all variables at the initial
time step using ANOVAs for continuous variables (FOB, load of Varroa, Nosema, BQCV,
and DWV) and chi-square tests of independence for binary variables (prevalence of Varroa,
Nosema, BQCV, and DWV).
To test whether the full suite of response variables collectively predicted colony treatment
membership, we conducted classification analyses for Experiments 1 (migratory vs.
stationary) and 2 (exposed vs. isolated) using linear combinations based on all response
variables (except BQCV prevalence as it was fixed at 100% prevalence for all groups and
as such caused model fitting failures). To examine how groups differed after experimental
manipulation, we used data from sampling events two and three for Experiments 1 and
2, respectively. The models were trained using a conservative cross validation approach
to reduce over-fitting the model to our data. We tested for differences between groups’
centroids in multivariate space for each time point with PERMANOVA, a non-parametric
MANOVA, using Euclidian distance-based dissimilarity matrices. To visualize between-
group separation, the centered values from linear discriminate functions (LD1 and LD2)
were plotted for each colony.
To test the effect of treatment and time on prevalence, we analyzed all pathogens
(Nosema, Varroa, BQCV, and DWV) using separate generalized linear mixed effects
models (GLMMs) using the binomial (link =‘‘logit’’) distribution family. For measures
of pathogen load, and FOB, we used linear mixed effects models (Harrison et al., 2018).
All models used the same repeated measures design. Treatment, sampling event, and their
interaction were included as fixed effects in order to determine how each dependent variable
was affected by our manipulation through time. Colony and bee yard were included as
random effects in order to determine the among colony variance within each treatment
and account for potential differences between bee yards. To examine how the Varroa load
of migratory and stationary colonies differed over time with respect to FOB, we conducted

Alger et al. (2018), PeerJ, DOI 10.7717/peerj.5812 7/22

 a separate linear mixed effects model. We first tested for temporal autocorrelation in the
residuals of the model using an ACF plot and no autocorrelation was detected. For this
model, we used FOB, treatment, time, and the resultant interactions as fixed effects and
colony as a random effect. Significance for all models was determined using Type II Wald
chi-square tests.
To examine potential differences in climate between California and North Carolina
during the 27 days the migratory bees were in California, we used one-way Analysis of
Variance (ANOVAs) on average daily temperature, precipitation, and wind speed by state
(NOAA National Centers for Environmental Information).
We conducted all statistical analyses using the statistical software ‘‘R’’ (R Core Team,
2016). GLMMs were conducted using the lme4 package (v 1.1-13) (Bates et al., 2015). The
corresponding Type II Wald chi-square tests were conducted using the Anova function
in the car package (v 2.1-4) (Fox & Weisberg, 2011). Temporal autocorrelation was tested
using the acf function. Classification analyses were conducted using the lda function in
the mass package (v 7.3-45) (Ripley & Venables, 2002). The adonis function was used to
perform PERMANOVA in the vegan package (v 2.4-3) (Oksanen et al., 2014).

RESULTS
While in California, migratory colonies experienced similar weather conditions (mean
daytime temperature, wind speed, and precipitation) to those experienced by stationary
colonies in North Carolina (F1,52 < 3.106, P > 0.084; Table S1). All colonies were absent
of IAPV. BQCV was present in all colonies for the duration of the study (Fig. S1).

Experiment 1: migratory verses stationary

At the start of the experiment, there was no significant difference between migratory and
stationary colonies in prevalence (χ12 < 1.143, P > 0.285) or load (F1,30 < 3.01, P > 0.093)
of any of the four pathogens. In addition, there was no difference in FOB at the beginning
of the experiment (migratory: 7.94 ± 0.57 sd, stationary: 7.44 ± 0.51 sd).
Upon the return of the migratory colonies, our pathogen and hive population
measurements collectively predicted whether a colony was migratory or stationary (Fig. 2A).
The linear combination (LD1) adequately discriminated between the migratory group and
the stationary group and yielded correct classification rates of 87.5% for migratory colonies
and 75% for stationary colonies. Also, prior to contact with the migratory colonies, the
exposed colonies were similar to the isolated stationary colonies and essentially formed
one large group (Fig. 2A). After contact with migratory colonies, there was statistically
significant group separation between migratory and stationary treatments (F1,30 = 5.03,
P = 0.007).
Migratory colonies returned from California with significantly higher BQCV loads
compared to the stationary group (χ12 = 16.488, P < 0.001; Fig. 3A), and BQCV load
increased with time (Fig. 3A and Table 1). The prevalence (Fig. S1) and load of DWV
(Fig. 3B) did not differ between treatments following return of migratory colonies but
both increased with time (Table 1). Nosema load and prevalence (Fig. S1) did not differ
between treatments following return of migratory colonies and Nosema load decreased with

Alger et al. (2018), PeerJ, DOI 10.7717/peerj.5812 8/22

 Figure 2 Pathogen community and colony health predicts treatment group membership. Linear com-
binations from discriminant analyses created from all pathogen variables (except BQCV prevalence) and
frames of bees for exposed (black), migratory (red) and stationary/isolated (blue) colonies. Axes represent
the percentage of between group variance explained. (A) Experiment 1 at sampling event two, migratory
and stationary colonies were separated by LD1 while stationary and exposed colonies are clustered. (B)
Experiment 2 at sampling event three, after the exposed group had been allowed to forage alongside the
migratory colonies, exposed and isolated were separated along LD2, while LD1 separated out migratory
colonies.The significant PERMANOVA tests for both experiments corroborated the differences between
group centroids. Circles represent 70% confidence intervals and are provided to visualize the centroids of
each group.
Full-size DOI: 10.7717/peerj.5812/fig-2

time (Table 1). However, for Varroa, there was a significant treatment × time interaction
(Fig. 3C). Varroa loads increased steadily for stationary colonies, but decreased in migratory
colonies over the month after returning from California (χ12 = 6.465, P = 0.011). There was
also a significant interaction of treatment × time for FOB, with migratory colonies returning
with fewer FOB than their stationary counterparts (χ12 = 5.651, P = 0.017). There was a
significant interaction of FOB × treatment × time on Varroa loads (χ12 = 4.045, P = 0.044)
indicating that Varroa loads were differentially affected by FOB for each treatment group
over time. Other interaction terms were not statistically significant (Table 1).

Experiment 2: exposed verses isolated

At sampling event two, there was no significant difference between exposed and isolated
stationary colonies in pathogen prevalence (χ12 < 1.143, P < 0.285) or load (F1,30 < 1.279,
P > 0.267). FOB was similar between groups at the beginning of the experiment
(F1,29 = 0.858, P = 0.362).
One month after the exposed group foraged alongside the migratory colonies, there
was an increase in between-group separation with groups becoming more distinguishable
from each other. While all groups separated in this third time step, the exposed and

Alger et al. (2018), PeerJ, DOI 10.7717/peerj.5812 9/22

 Figure 3 Pathogen and colony population metrics for treatment groups through time. Migratory
(solid line) and stationary/isolated (dotted line) colonies were sampled at three time points and exposed
(gray) colonies were sampled at two time points. Sampling event (1) occurred before migratory colonies
were transported, (2) upon their return, and (3) one month after return. Panels show results for three
pathogens and one health metric: (A) black queen cell virus (BQCV) in log genome copies per bee
(B) deformed wing virus (DWV) in log genome copies per bee (C) Varroa load in mites per 100 bees
and (D) Frames of bees (FOB), as a proxy for colony population. In Experiment 1: migratory verses
stationary/isolated colonies, there was a significant effect of time for all measures. For BQCV, there was a
significant effect of treatment. There was a significant time × treatment interaction for FOB and Varroa.
In Experiment 2: exposed colonies verses stationary/isolated, there was a significant effect of time for each
measure. For DWV, there was a significant time × treatment interaction. Bars represent standard errors.
Full-size DOI: 10.7717/peerj.5812/fig-3

migratory groups were less distinguishable from one another compared to the stationary
group (Fig. 2B). The linear combinations (LD1 and LD2) yielded a correct classification
rate of 75% for stationary colonies but correct classification rates for migratory and
exposed colonies were lower, 43.75% and 56.25%, respectively. PERMANOVA results
indicated statistically significant group separation between isolated, migratory and exposed
treatments (F2,43 = 4.72, P = 0.001).

Alger et al. (2018), PeerJ, DOI 10.7717/peerj.5812 10/22

 Table 1 Summary statistics for experiment 1: migratory verses stationary.

Variable Effect χ12 Pa Sigb

DWV load Treatment 0.004 0.9512
Time 39.328 <0.001 ***
Treatment:Time 0.1592 0.690
DWV prev. Treatment 0.067 0.796
Time 15.805 <0.001 ***
Treatment:Time 0.024 0.878
BQCV load Treatment 16.488 <0.001 ***
Time 187.235 <0.001 ***
Treatment:Time 2.229 0.135
Varroa load Treatment 0.413 0.520
Time 18.391 <0.001 ***
Treatment:Time 6.465 0.011 *
Varroa prev. Treatment 1.290 0.256
Time 4.896 0.0270 *
Treatment:Time 3.21 0.073
Nosema load Treatment 0.645 0.422
Time 30.855 <0.001 ***
Treatment:Time 0.280 0.596
Nosema prev. Treatment 0.007 0.931
Time 3.652 0.056
Treatment:Time 3.352 0.067
FOB Treatment 3.597 0.058
Time 152.838 <0.001 ***
Treatment:Time 5.651 0.0174 *
Notes.
DWV load, deformed wing virus load; DWV prev., deformed wing virus prevalence; BQCV load, black queen cell virus
load; Varroa prev., Varroa prevalence; Nosema prev., Nosema prevalence; FOB, frames of bees.
Prevalence is the percentage of colonies positive for a pathogen (DWV, Nosema, and Varroa). Virus load (DWV and BQCV)
results for each colony are presented in average virus genome copies/bee. Nosema load is reported as average number of
spores/bee and Varroa is reported as number of mites per 100 bees.
a
Significance for all models was determined using Type II Wald chi-square tests.
b
Asterisks represent level of significance.

We found no effects of treatment (exposed verses isolated) for any of the parasite
or disease response variables (Fig. 3). However, Varroa prevalence and load, Nosema
prevalence and load, and BQCV significantly increased with time (Table 2). There was
a significant treatment × time interaction for both DWV load (χ12 = 9.229, P = 0.002;
Fig. 3B) and DWV prevalence (χ12 = 4.94, P = 0.026; Fig. S1) such that DWV in exposed
colonies increased at significantly higher rates than the isolated group. There was also a
significant treatment × time interaction for FOB (χ12 = 9.946, P = 0.0016; Fig. 3D) with
exposed bees increasing at a significantly higher rate compared to the isolated group. Other
interaction terms were not significant (Table 2).

Alger et al. (2018), PeerJ, DOI 10.7717/peerj.5812 11/22

 Table 2 Summary statistics for experiment 2: exposed verses isolated.

Variable Effect χ12 Pa Sig.b

DWV load Treatment 2.056 0.152
Time 23.510 <0.001 ***
Treatment:Time 9.229 0.002 **
DWV prev. Treatment 0.025 0.874
Time 8.811 0.003 **
Treatment:Time 4.945 0.026 *
BQCV load Treatment 1.355 0.244
Time 58.001 <0.001 ***
Treatment:Time 0.054 0.816
Varroa load Treatment 0.471 0.493
Time 23.658 <0.001 ***
Treatment:Time 0.191 0.662
Varroa prev. Treatment 1.390 0.238
Time 10.129 0.001 **
Treatment:Time 0.060 0.806
Nosema load Treatment 0.882 0.348
Time 37.926 <0.001 ***
Treatment:Time 0.260 0.610
Nosema prev. Treatment 0 0.1
Time 7.771 0.005 **
Treatment:Time 0.004 0.950
FOB Treatment 1.899 0.168
Time 89.191 <0.001 ***
Treatment:Time 9.946 0.002 **
Notes.
DWV load, deformed wing virus load; DWV prev., deformed wing virus prevalence; BQCV load, black queen cell virus
load; Varroa prev., Varroa prevalence; Nosema prev., Nosema prevalence; FOB, frames of bees.
Prevalence is the percentage of colonies positive for a pathogen (DWV, Nosema, and Varroa). Virus load (DWV and BQCV)
results for each colony are presented in average virus genome copies/bee. Nosema load is reported as average number of
spores/bee and Varroa is reported as number of mites per 100 bees.
a
Significance for all models was determined using Type II Wald chi-square tests.
b
Asterisks represent level of significance.

DISCUSSION
Migratory pollination services are an essential component of the US agricultural economy,
yet this practice exposes honey bee colonies to a combination of factors that may
compromise individual bee and colony health. Although there is widespread concern
that migratory pollination can place honey bee colonies at increased risk to acquire and
spread pathogens and parasites, there is a lack of experimental evidence demonstrating
this phenomenon. Here, we controlled for management practices and starting conditions
as well as the time at which bees were sampled for diseases and parasites. Our results show
that while migratory conditions can negatively affect colony health and increase disease
load, in some cases these impacts were transient.
With the exception of Nosema, honey bee colonies experienced an increase in pathogen
prevalence and load over time with the highest levels occurring during the last sampling

Alger et al. (2018), PeerJ, DOI 10.7717/peerj.5812 12/22

 event in March, following the seasonal trends of other time-course studies (Tentcheva et al.,
2004; Runckel et al., 2011). Peak incidences of these viruses occur in warmer months when
transmission is more likely to occur as a result of increased brood rearing (Chen & Siede,
2007) and increased foraging (Singh et al., 2010) However, for BQCV and Varroa, our
results indicate that bees in the migratory conditions were affected differently compared to
their stationary counterparts.
The migratory colonies in our study returned from almond pollination with higher
BQCV loads compared to the stationary colonies but had converged to similar levels one
month later indicating that migratory conditions exacerbated BQCV infection but these
effects were transient. Colonies experience stress during transportation (Simone-Finstrom et
al., 2016) which impairs immunity (James & Xu, 2012) and promotes elevated levels of virus
replication. Pollinators of large monocultures experience a reduction in forage diversity
(Decourtye, Mader & Desneux, 2010; Colwell et al., 2017) which increases susceptibility to
disease (Di Pasquale et al., 2013). Exposure to agricultural chemicals adversely affects the
insect immune response and promotes replication of RNA viruses in bees (Di Prisco et al.,
2013; Doublet et al., 2015). In particular, higher BQCV titers are associated with exposure
to organosilicone surfactant adjuvants (OSS), a class of surfactants used to enhance the
spread of the active ingredient (Fine, Cox-Foster & Mullin, 2017). OSSs are heavily used
in California almonds during the late January to March bloom period when migratory
colonies are present (Ciarlo et al., 2012; Mullin et al., 2016). In addition to OSSs, bees
involved in almond pollination may also be exposed to a wide range of pesticides. In
recent years, the use of insecticides, herbicides, and fungicides has steadily increased in
California almond crops (CDPR (California Department of Pesticide Regulation) CalPIP,
2016). We did not measure pesticide or OSS exposure in our colonies and are therefore
cautious to speculate its role in the increased virus loads in our study. However, in light
of our results and previous work, we believe pesticide-pathogen interactions in migratory
colonies warrants further study.
Compared to stationary colonies, the migratory colonies had fewer FOB upon return
from California. The lower population size observed may be a result of forager die-off
after the large pollination event, as migratory bees have significantly shorter lifespans when
compared to stationary bees as a result of increased oxidative stress (Simone-Finstrom et
al., 2016). In addition, foragers could have been displaced during transit. As typical with
migratory colonies, our colonies were moved to holding yards before and after pollinating
almonds. When colonies are moved, foragers are forced to re-assess and re-learn their
surroundings which can cause significant loss and/or drifting of foragers (Nelson & Jay,
1989). Despite migratory colonies returning with fewer numbers and remaining lower
in FOB compared to stationary colonies, the two groups experienced similar population
growth rates during the month following the large pollination event.
Upon return from California, mite prevalence and load in migratory colonies were
similar to their stationary counterparts. However, when sampled one month later, mite
prevalence and load in the stationary colonies had significantly increased, while mite
prevalence and load in the migratory colonies declined slightly, and was significantly lower
than that in stationary colonies. Since female mites must reproduce within the pupal cells

Alger et al. (2018), PeerJ, DOI 10.7717/peerj.5812 13/22

 of developing honey bees, mite population growth is largely dependent on the availability
of bee brood. Although we did not measure brood size, adult bee population size is highly
correlated with brood size of the previous time step (Torres, Ricoy & Roybal, 2015) and
mite population size (Martin, 1998; DeGrandi-Hoffman et al., 2016). Thus, the lower mite
prevalence and load in migratory bees is likely, in part, a reflection of the lower reproduction
of these colonies. Additional unknown factors may be influencing the lower mite loads
in migratory colonies, as Varroa loads of the migratory and stationary colonies showed
different relationships with FOB over time. Results of the US National Honey Bee Disease
survey suggested that migratory beekeepers may treat with acaricide more effectively and
the mechanical motion of the truck during transportation helps to dislodge mites from
bees (Traynor et al., 2016b). Since our colonies returned from California with similar mite
prevalence and load as the stationary group, it is unlikely that the motion of the truck had
an impact. Additionally, we are confident that the difference in mites we saw during the last
sampling event was not due to beekeeper practices as mite treatments were standardized
across all groups.
Colonies exposed to migratory bees experienced a significantly greater increase in DWV
prevalence and load compared to isolated colonies one month after foraging alongside
the migratory colonies. Varroa loads could not explain this difference since exposed and
isolated colonies experienced similar Varroa loads throughout the study. The greater
population size of the exposed colonies in the last sampling event, could have increased
dissemination of DWV. However, isolated colonies had higher bee populations than the
migratory colonies and we saw no differences in DWV prevalence or load between those
two groups. Previous studies found that DWV was a good predictor of weaker colonies
(Budge et al., 2015) and thus one would not expect our results to simply be attributed to an
increase in numbers and thus exposure. One potential explanation is that the migratory bees
returned from pollinating almonds with a more virulent DWV strain that disseminated
quickly in the exposed group as a result of their larger colony size and higher Varroa
population (Martin, 2002; Rosenkranz, Aumeier & Ziegelmann, 2010; Glenny et al., 2017).
Using deep sequencing, viruses not previously found in honey bees have been detected in
migratory hives (Runckel et al., 2011) and recently, a more virulent recombinant of DWV
was found to replicate at high levels when transmitted by Varroa mites (Ryabov et al.,
2014). Despite this evidence, we remain cautious of speculating transmission of a novel or
more virulent strain.

CONCLUSIONS
Migratory bees are subjected to a myriad of stressors not experienced by their stationary
counterparts including transport, lower diversity of floral resources, exposure to bees from
tens of thousands of other colonies that may be diseased, and exposure to large quantities of
pesticides. The migratory conditions in our experiment encompassed all these components,
and thus we cannot attribute our results to a single or even an exact combination of causes.
Furthermore, our study, while novel in scope, was conducted over a relatively short time
span using a single set of migratory conditions and focused on a limited set of bee pathogens.

Alger et al. (2018), PeerJ, DOI 10.7717/peerj.5812 14/22

 Thus, we are cautious to claim that our results are representative of migratory beekeeping,
at large, but do suggest that migratory conditions may exacerbate BQCV infections and
lead to slower colony growth. Future studies to examine the underlying mechanisms,
individually and in concert, as well as those that encompass colony health and additional
pest and pathogens over a longer time span will provide further insight.
A growing body of evidence suggests that pests and pathogens from managed bees
are spilling over into wild bee populations (Colla et al., 2006; Spiewok & Neumann,
2006; Hoffmann, Pettis & Neumann, 2008; Otterstatter & Thomson, 2008; Singh et al., 2010;
Graystock et al., 2013; Levitt et al., 2013; Brown, 2017). Sympatric bumble bees and honey
bees are infected by the same strains of DWV (Fürst et al., 2014) and virus prevalence in
honey bees is a significant predictor of virus prevalence in bumble bees (McMahon et al.,
2015). The higher BQCV load we document in migratory bees could thus pose a risk to
wild bees. It is also possible that increased disease load as a consequence of migratory
pollination could affect honey bees in future years due to disease spillback from infected
wild bees (Graystock, Goulson & Hughes, 2015). Therefore, it is important to test whether
wild bee populations have higher disease prevalence in proximity to honey bee apiaries,
particularly those with migratory management practices.
According to recent forecasts, the US demand for commercial crop pollination services
is expected to rise, particularly for almond (USDA National Agricultural Statistics Service,
2017c). Thus, understanding the effects of this current model of crop pollination on bees
and identifying where, when, and how to mitigate those effects are critical to the apiculture
industry. Our work suggests that some effects, while important, may be transitory. Thus,
honey bees may be resilient to some stressors imposed by migratory conditions and
recuperation after large pollination events is important to maintaining healthy migratory
colonies.

ACKNOWLEDGEMENTS
We would like to thank Joseph Schall, Greer Sargeant and Kendall Eppley for their assistance
in the laboratory, and Jeff Lee for transporting the honey bee colonies across the country
to California and back.

ADDITIONAL INFORMATION AND DECLARATIONS

Funding
This work was supported through http://experiment.com crowdfunding (http:
//www.experiment.com/beekeeping) with contributions from: the Vermont Beekeepers
Associations, NH Beekeepers Association, Aaron J. Schwartz, Karla Eisen and George H.
Wilson, Phyllis E. Burnham, Kay Newhouse, Edward and Jacqueline Alger, Dan Boisvert,
Allison Malloy, Jonathan Alger, Amy Handy, William Castro (http://beefriendlyapiary.
com), Kay Newhouse, Karla Eisen and George H. Wilson, Caydee Savinelli, and Richard
Reid. Partial funding for open access provided by the UMD Libraries’ Open Access
Publishing Fund. The funders had no role in study design, data collection and analysis,
decision to publish, or preparation of the manuscript.

Alger et al. (2018), PeerJ, DOI 10.7717/peerj.5812 15/22

 Grant Disclosures
The following grant information was disclosed by the authors:
Vermont Beekeepers Associations.
NH Beekeepers Association.
UMD Libraries’ Open Access Publishing Fund.

Competing Interests
The authors declare there are no competing interests.

Author Contributions
• Samantha A. Alger conceived and designed the experiments, performed the experiments,
analyzed the data, contributed reagents/materials/analysis tools, prepared figures and/or
tables, authored or reviewed drafts of the paper, approved the final draft.
• P. Alexander Burnham conceived and designed the experiments, performed the
experiments, analyzed the data, contributed reagents/materials/analysis tools, prepared
figures and/or tables, authored or reviewed drafts of the paper.
• Zachary S. Lamas conceived and designed the experiments, performed the experiments,
contributed reagents/materials/analysis tools, authored or reviewed drafts of the paper.
• Alison K. Brody contributed reagents/materials/analysis tools, authored or reviewed
drafts of the paper.
• Leif L. Richardson conceived and designed the experiments, contributed reagents/mate-
rials/analysis tools, authored or reviewed drafts of the paper.

Data Availability
The following information was supplied regarding data availability:
GitHub: https://github.com/samanthaannalger/AlgerProjects/tree/master/Migratory
Stationary.

Supplemental Information
Supplemental information for this article can be found online at http://dx.doi.org/10.7717/
peerj.5812#supplemental-information.

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