One of the problems in the modern beekeeping era is the fungus that infects honeybee gut cells; the
microsporidium Nosema ceranae honeybee researchers hypothesized that stimulating the gut microbiome
using pre and probiotics could interfere with the life cycle of this disturbing honeybee enemy
Can the use of pre and probiotics manipulate the gut ecosystem to
help honeybees to fight Nosema infection?
The fungus Nosema ceranae is an obligate intracellular parasite infecting cells
in the digestive tract and can have a number of detrimental effects on honey bees Apis mellifera,
including degeneration of the hypopharyngeal glands, degeneration of the midgut epithelium,
reduction of nutrient absorption, and increasing energetic stress,
immunosuppression, early onset of foraging behavior, decreased homing and orientation, and
decreased lifespan and food storage in honeybee colonies.
The important role that gut microorganisms play in digestive health as well as overall honeybee
health and immunity may provide a means to help managing Nosema ceranae infections.
The honeybee gut microbiome is comprised of a large variety of bacteria including numerous
lactic acid bacteria with the genus lactobacillus as well as bacteria in the genus bifidobacterium.
The gut microbiota protects honeybees from pathogen infections by lowering the pH,
competing with pathogens for nutrients in space, and producing organic acids, antimicrobial
peptides, and bacteriocins. Nourishing and enhancing this community of microorganisms through
supplementation with prebiotics and probiotics may help reduce Nosema ceranae infections.
Prebiotics are non-digestible carbohydrates and food ingredients that have been shown
to increase the growth and metabolic activity of the microorganisms found in the alimentary tract
meaning that they are not food for honeybees; they are food for the bacterias inside the
honeybee gut. Probiotics are living organisms that are ingested with the goal of altering
the gut microbiome by increasing beneficial microbes and reducing pathogenic species.
Probiotics are believed to help prevent or treat unbalanced microfauna resulting from
disease or antibiotics. There is evidence in the scientific literature about the benefits and also
problems of giving pre and probiotics to honey bees. I will cover many of them
in future videos. Today's video is about a successful case that I want your opinion about it
In february of 2021 a group of researchers from the Ontario beekeepers association technology
transfer program, and the school of environmental sciences at the University of Guelph in Canada
led by Dr. Daniel Borgers published a study where they looked at the role of
pre and probiotics in the dynamics of Nosema ceranae infection in laboratory conditions.
After infecting honeybees with Nosema spores in the laboratory, the researchers fed the bees
with different pre and probiotics and evaluated mortality and the total number of spores per bee
after 16 days. The prebiotics chosen were Acacia gum, Inulin and Fructooligosaccharides.
Compounds that you can easily find on any vitamins and supplement store. And the probiotics chosen
were Protexin concentrate single strain Protexin concentrate multiple strains
and Vetafarm Probotic which is composed with the same bacteria composition of Protexin concentrate
multiple strain but with a higher concentration. In a screening test comparing with the positive
control group that reached an infection rate of 1.7 times 10 to the seven spores per bee,
Acacia gum Protexin concentrates single strain protects in concentrate multi-strain
and fructooligosaccharides treatments resulted in significantly lower spore numbers
acacia gum reduced 67 percent Protexin concentrate single strain reduce
59 percent Protexin concentrate multi-strain reduce 34 percent and fructooligosaccharide
reduce 31 percent of Nosema spores. The results look very promising,
especially in respect of Acacia gum. However, when the researchers look at the mortality rate,
they found that acacia gum had a significant increase in mortality about 62 percent of the
bees died consuming the prebiotic compared with seven to seven percent found in control
groups all other products did not show significant mortality differences compared with the controls.
Therefore, the researchers decided to exclude acacia gum from further experiments.
After the preliminary screening researchers decided to look what is the best dosage to get
the beneficial effect Vetafarm Probotic showed that only 2.5 milligrams per ml resulted in a
significantly lower number of spores compared with the controls but when you increase the
dosage the effect was gone. For Protexin single strain all dosages result in a significantly
lower count of Nosema spores compared with the controls. However for Protexin multi-strain
the positive significant results observed in the screening experiment using 0.25 milligrams per ml
fell apart when more doses were tested allowing for more powerful statistical analysis.
When the researchers compare the survival data from the two probiotics that show positive results
with spore counts in previous experiments both products Vetafarm Probotic in green
and Protexin concentrate single strain in purple survivored longer when compared with the bees
infected with Nosema ceranae alone show it in red here. Interestingly Protexin concentrate
single-strand survivorship was better than the negative controls which were bees not infected
with Nosema ceranae at all. This whole experiment here is a clear demonstration of the variability
that frequently happens in beekeeping sometimes increasing the dosage of something assuming it
will amplify the results ends up reversing the expected results and sometimes one organism
alone is better than the same organism combined with multiple others. In a single study like
this one in laboratory controlled conditions you could clearly see that details matter.
Imagine how many different scenarios you're going to face in a real beekeeping operation
where you cannot control most of the variables. For example I use probiotics from StrongMicrobials
I establish brand of probiotics for honeybees on two occasions. The first time I could not find
any difference in my bees however the second time in a different location with different beekeeping
procedures I got a very nice significant beneficial results comparing with the controls
not treated with the probiotics. There is a lot of research to be done for us to know exactly
when and in what conditions probiotics can help the bees. As I mentioned before, I will bring
other research articles about probiotics on future videos, and if you want to know in advance which
videos i'm making, please consider supporting me on Patreon where I post more content about bees
and interact with supporters on a personal level. If you like this video you will love this one
right here. Thanks for watching InsideTheHive.TV, the show about bees. See you guys next week