{"id":28127,"date":"2025-05-20T00:01:00","date_gmt":"2025-05-19T16:01:00","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.curtin.edu.au\/news\/?post_type=media-release&p=28127"},"modified":"2025-05-16T16:16:03","modified_gmt":"2025-05-16T08:16:03","slug":"fitness-fight-native-bees-struggle-against-invasive-honey-bee","status":"publish","type":"media-release","link":"https:\/\/www.curtin.edu.au\/news\/media-release\/fitness-fight-native-bees-struggle-against-invasive-honey-bee\/","title":{"rendered":"Fitness fight: native bees struggle against invasive honey bee"},"content":{"rendered":"\n

New Â鶹ֱ²¥ research has revealed that high densities of European honey bees could be harming Australian native bees\u2019 \u2018fitness\u2019 by reducing their reproductive success and altering key traits linked to survival.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

The study, led by Adjunct Research Fellow Dr Kit Prendergast<\/a> from Curtin\u2019s School of Molecular and Life Sciences, found that honey bees not only dominate pollen resources but may also affect the fitness of native cavity-nesting bees \u2013 with concerning consequences for biodiversity.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Dr Prendergast said the study used specially designed wooden \u2018bee hotels\u2019 located in 14 urban bushland and garden sites in Perth, Western Australia, to assess how honey bee density influenced key indicators of native bee health and reproduction over two Spring-to-Summer bee seasons.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\u201cBee hotels are more than just a way to give bees a place to nest \u2013 they\u2019re powerful research tools that let us measure how well native bees are surviving and reproducing in different environments,\u201d Dr Prendergast said.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\u201cWe also studied 1000 native bee nests which provided valuable insights into the fitness of at least 25 species,\u201d she said.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\u201cIn areas with higher honey bee densities, native bees produced fewer female offspring, had higher offspring mortality and the males that did emerge were smaller \u2013 all of which are signs of reduced fitness.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Dr Prendergast said the research also looked at what types of pollen were being used by bees and found honey bees foraged from a wider range of sources, including exotic plants.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\u201cIn some conditions, greater overlap in pollen use was associated with lower offspring numbers in native bees,\u201d Dr Prendergast said.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\u201cThis shows that honey bees are not as benign as some might think \u2013 they can negatively impact local ecosystems and potentially contribute to declines in native bee populations,\u201d she said.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\u201cThese findings add to growing evidence that we need to manage honey bee densities carefully, especially in areas of high conservation value or where native pollinators are already under pressure from factors such as growing urbanisation.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Dr Prendergast said future research should explore whether adjusting honey bee numbers or increasing the diversity of flowering plants could help reduce their impact on native bees.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

The study was done as part of Dr Prendergast\u2019s PhD research at Curtin and was supported by funding from the City of Stirling, the Australian Wildlife Society, Hesperia and the Forrest Research Foundation.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

The full study \u2018Introduced honey bees have the potential to reduce fitness of cavity-nesting native bees in terms of a male bias sex ratio, brood mortality and reduced reproduction<\/em>\u2019 is published in \u2018Frontiers in Bee Science\u2019<\/em> and can be accessed here: doi: 10.3389\/frbee.2025.1508958<\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

New Â鶹ֱ²¥ research has revealed that high densities of European honey bees could be […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":4307,"featured_media":28128,"template":"","meta":{"_acf_changed":true,"_oasis_is_in_workflow":0,"_oasis_original":0,"_oasis_task_priority":"","_relevanssi_hide_post":"","_relevanssi_hide_content":"","_relevanssi_pin_for_all":"","_relevanssi_pin_keywords":"","_relevanssi_unpin_keywords":"","_relevanssi_related_keywords":"","_relevanssi_related_include_ids":"","_relevanssi_related_exclude_ids":"","_relevanssi_related_no_append":"","_relevanssi_related_not_related":"","_relevanssi_related_posts":"","_relevanssi_noindex_reason":"","wds_primary_category":0,"wds_primary_research-areas":0,"footnotes":""},"categories":[284],"tags":[],"research-areas":[],"class_list":["post-28127","media-release","type-media-release","status-publish","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-science-and-engineering"],"acf":{"post_options":{"":null,"additional_content":{"title":"","content":"","image":false},"related_courses":[{"title":"","qualification":"","link":"","description":"","faculty":""}],"credits":{"author":"","photographer":"","media":[24386,24381]},"display_author":true,"banner":{"image":false}},"experts":false},"featured_image":"https:\/\/www.curtin.edu.au\/news\/wp-content\/uploads\/2025\/05\/FOR-WEB-Native-bee-in-bee-hotel.-Picture-Dr-Kit-Prendergast-1000x500.jpg","author_meta":{"first_name":"Lucien","last_name":"Wilkinson","display_name":"Lucien Wilkinson"},"publishpress_future_workflow_manual_trigger":{"enabledWorkflows":[]},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.curtin.edu.au\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media-release\/28127","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.curtin.edu.au\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media-release"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.curtin.edu.au\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/media-release"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.curtin.edu.au\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/4307"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.curtin.edu.au\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media-release\/28127\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.curtin.edu.au\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/28128"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.curtin.edu.au\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=28127"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.curtin.edu.au\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=28127"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.curtin.edu.au\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=28127"},{"taxonomy":"research-areas","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.curtin.edu.au\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/research-areas?post=28127"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}