Evidence map›Paper›PMID 25165632›Full record

ArticlePeerJ2014

The relationship between managed bees and the prevalence of parasites in bumblebees.

Peter Graystock, Dave Goulson, William O H Hughes

Abstract read
In one paragraph

Article in PeerJ, 2014. The graph could read no effect estimate from its abstract, so it casts no vote on the map. Cited by 45 papers, 1 of them a synthesis that pooled it.

0numbers the graph read from it
0cells of the map it votes in
45citing papers in PubMed, 1 pooled it
–field-weighted citation impact
1 · What the graph read from it

What it found

Each row is one number read from the abstract, on the scale the paper reported it, with its interval. Left of the dashed line favours the treatment, right favours the comparator. Under each row is the sentence it came from. New to these charts? A ten-minute tutorial.

The abstract states no effect estimate the extractor could read, or names no intervention and outcome on the map, so this paper lights no cell and moves no belief. It is still indexed, cited and linked below.

2 · The registry

The trial behind it

Trials whose registry record cites this paper, or whose number appears in the abstract. A trial that started after this paper was published is citing it as background, not reporting it.

Neither the registry nor the abstract names a trial number. If this is a trial report, that itself is worth knowing.

3 · Its place in the literature

Who cites it

45 citing papers in PubMed, 1 synthesis or guideline pooled it.

  1. Pooled it
  2. Article
  3. Article
  4. Review
  5. The Role of Pathogens in Bumblebee Decline: A Review.Pathogens (Basel, Switzerland) · 2025
    Review
  6. Article
  7. Review
  8. Article
  9. Article
  10. Article
  11. Review
  12. Article
  13. Article
  14. Detection ofPathogens (Basel, Switzerland) · 2022
    Article
  15. Article
  16. Expanding insect pollinators in the Anthropocene.Biological reviews of the Cambridge Philosophical Society · 2021
    Review
  17. Article
  18. Article
  19. Pathogens Spillover from Honey Bees to Other Arthropods.Pathogens (Basel, Switzerland) · 2021
    Review
  20. Article
4 · The record

Corrections and comments

PubMed lists nothing against this paper. Absence here is not a guarantee, only a check that was made.

5 · Who and what money

Authors and funding

3 authors.

Peter GraystockSchool of Biology, University of Leeds , Leeds , UK.
Dave GoulsonSchool of Life Sciences, University of Sussex , Brighton , UK.
William O H HughesSchool of Life Sciences, University of Sussex , Brighton , UK.

Funding

No grant is acknowledged in the PubMed record.

6 · The paper itself

Abstract

Honey bees and, more recently, bumblebees have been domesticated and are now managed commercially primarily for crop pollination, mixing with wild pollinators during foraging on shared flower resources. There is mounting evidence that managed honey bees or commercially produced bumblebees may affect the health of wild pollinators such as bumblebees by increasing competition for resources and the prevalence of parasites in wild bees. Here we screened 764 bumblebees from around five greenhouses that either used commercially produced bumblebees or did not, as well as bumblebees from 10 colonies placed at two sites either close to or far from a honey bee apiary, for the parasites Apicystis bombi, Crithidia bombi, Nosema bombi, N. ceranae, N. apis and deformed wing virus. We found that A. bombi and C. bombi were more prevalent around greenhouses using commercially produced bumblebees, while C. bombi was 18% more prevalent in bumblebees at the site near to the honey bee apiary than those at the site far from the apiary. Whilst these results are from only a limited number of sites, they support previous reports of parasite spillover from commercially produced bumblebees to wild bumblebees, and suggest that the impact of stress from competing with managed bees or the vectoring of parasites by them on parasite prevalence in wild bees needs further investigation. It appears increasingly likely that the use of managed bees comes at a cost of increased parasites in wild bumblebees, which is not only a concern for bumblebee conservation, but which may impact other pollinators as well.

Indexed as

Commercial bumblebee productionHoneybeePathogen spilloverPollinator conservation

Identifiers

PMID25165632
PMCPMC4137657

What OpenQuestion holds

Textmetadata
LicenceCC BY
Read underepoch 390

Registered trials

None linked

Read under generation 80e0d062 · epoch 390. Bibliography from PubMed, PubMed Central and OpenAlex; grants from NIH RePORTER; trial links from ClinicalTrials.gov; estimates, votes and beliefs from the OpenQuestion graph.