A technical semi-field methodology to measure the effect of nutrition on honeybee brood rearing

Abstract

A honeybee colonys well-being is its ability to nurture larvae into healthy adults. Understanding how nutrition supports brood rearing is crucial for developing diets that could aid against environmental threats. Nutritional research on whole colony brood development has been historically challenging due to difficulties documenting the diets impact on brood production over time. We describe a novel semi-field method to study the influence of nutrition on brood rearing using standardised small colonies formed de novo (ca. 1500 nurse-age bees and a queen) housed in adapted mating-nucs, placed inside an enclosure and limited to feeding on chemically defined diets. Complete assessments were conducted every fifteen days, assisted by a bespoke device to photograph every frame to measure cell contents. A novel metric describes the number of bees generated per gram of diet consumed, measuring the impact of nutrition on brood rearing and overall colony size.