In nineteenth-century New England, it was held to be essential to whisper to beehives of a loved one’s death.

Winter losses in honey bee colonies, Apis mellifera, raise concerns both for their critical role in crop pollination and for the sustainability of beekeeping.

In cases of acute intoxication, honeybees often lay in front of their hives for several days, exposed to sunlight and weather, before a beekeeper can take a sample. Beekeepers send samples to analytical laboratories, but sometimes no residues can be detected. Temperature and sun light could infuence the decrease of pesticides in bee samples and thereby residues left for analysis

There was a time when almost every rural British family who kept bees followed a strange tradition.

The challenges for bees in Europe and the world are widely recognised and have been an increasing priority by several institutional actors. For instance, the previous president of the European Commission, Jean Claude Juncker...