Periodic Reporting for period 1 - WILDPOSH (PAN EUROPEAN ASSESSMENT, MONITORING, AND MITIGATION OF CHEMICAL STRESSORS ON THE HEALTH OF WILD POLLINATORS)
Reporting period: 2024-01-01 to 2025-06-30
Wild fauna and flora are facing variable and challenging environmental disturbances. One of the animal groups that is most impacted by this concerns pollinators. Pollinators face multiple threats, but the spread of anthropogenic chemicals (i.e. pesticides) forms a major potential driver of these threats. WildPosh is a multi-actor, transdisciplinary project whose overarching mission and ambition are to significantly improve the evaluation of risk to pesticide exposure of wild pollinators and enhance the sustainable health of pollinators and pollination services in Europe. As chemical exposure varies geographically, across cropping systems, inside the crop system and among pollinators, we will characterize exposure by doing fieldwork in 4 countries representing the four main climatic European regions, Mediterranean, Atlantic, Continental and Boreal climate in Germany, England, Estonia and Spain. We will also develop experiments in controlled conditions on different species of bees, syrphid flies, moths and butterflies, and collect in silico data on their traits and on toxicity of pesticides. With WildPosh, we aim to achieve the following objectives:
1. Determining the real-world agrochemical exposure profile of wild pollinators at landscape level, within and among sites;
2. Using integrated and controlled laboratory and semi-field experiments to characterise causal relationships between pesticides and pollinator health;
3. Building an open database on pollinator traits/distribution and chemicals to define exposure and toxicity scenarios by developing databases on ecological traits and the spatial distribution of pollinators in relation to their potential exposure to pesticide;
4. Proposing integrated systems-based risk assessment tools for risk assessment for wild pollinators; and
5. Driving policy and practice through interactive innovation, meeting the need for monitoring tools, novel and innovative screening protocols for practice and policymaker use.
1. Determining the real-world agrochemical exposure profile of wild pollinators at landscape level, within and among sites;
2. Using integrated and controlled laboratory and semi-field experiments to characterise causal relationships between pesticides and pollinator health;
3. Building an open database on pollinator traits/distribution and chemicals to define exposure and toxicity scenarios by developing databases on ecological traits and the spatial distribution of pollinators in relation to their potential exposure to pesticide;
4. Proposing integrated systems-based risk assessment tools for risk assessment for wild pollinators; and
5. Driving policy and practice through interactive innovation, meeting the need for monitoring tools, novel and innovative screening protocols for practice and policymaker use.
The selection of field methods to determine sources and routes of pesticide exposure in environmental compartments/matrices is done, and the sampling is almost completed (WP1). The development of protocols to test sensitivity of wild pollinators to pesticides in controlled conditions is achieved, including selection of pollinator species for testing, and development of methods to detect lethal and sublethal effects (WP2). The implementation of these protocols for 15 species of wild pollinators is ongoing, and semi-field experiments on a subset of species have been initiated (WP2). MALDI-MS molecular fingerprints are being elaborated for bees and hoverflies, together with the optimization of the proteomic strategy, the definition of diagnostic transcriptional signatures, and the development of annotated genomes for umbrella species of pollinators (WP3). Data gathering has started, for traits and distribution of bees, hoverflies, butterflies and moths, along with landscape parameters and a critical review of all existing relevant in silico prediction methodologies and pesticide ERA frameworks (WP4). The user-friendly Toolbox for stakeholders integrating data from WP1-WP4 is under development (WP5). The project has been regularly engaging across a wide range of national and international science-policy activities (WP6-7).
WildPosh established a pan-European site network across two major cropping systems (wheat and oilseed rape) to characterise sources and routes of pesticide exposure in the key pollinator groups. We sampled the level of contamination of six matrices (pollen, nectar, water, plant matrices, soil, and pollen from bumblebee workers).
We developed new protocols for monitoring pesticide impact, extending the novel methods for lab-based testing of pesticide on wild bees to a higher diversity of wild pollinators (18 species so far). We determined the ecotoxicology and toxicokinetic of major pesticides and their mixtures across 11 pollinator species of bees, hoverflies and butterflies in laboratory conditions, and of two species in semi-field conditions. WildPosh is also improving MALDI PolTyping®, which is a laboratory tool to monitor pollinator health through simple, non-lethal, field-collection of a pollinator’s hemolymph. We expect that this approach will become a fundamental component of future global solutions for health management plans for pollinators, and become a referenced, fast, cost-effective and automatable analytical procedure to demonstrate the presence of stressors.
We are compiling a comprehensive open-source database about distribution and about traits, which includes morphological/ecological traits reflecting the sensitivity of European pollinators to pesticides and other stressors (e.g. nutrition, climate, parasite). Combining both databases will inform about the risk to pesticide exposure. In this way, WildPosh will be able to define traits associated with sensitivity to pesticides, thereby identifying sensitive ‘umbrella’ species whose protection will benefit the broader community of pollinators. We are additionally building a database to include information on pesticide use, as well as on other stressors able to amplify the adverse effects. In this way, we develop an open-source curated database on pollinators and the use of pesticides.
We are critically reviewing all existing prediction methodologies (QSAR models, category approach, read-across), identifying the most important gaps and sources of uncertainty and will propose improved strategies for increasing their ability to predict risk, facilitating the regulatory acceptance of in silico methods and their integration the ERA process. Moreover, we will develop methodologies for risk assessment in open-source tools. WildPosh will integrate existing and newly created data and models into an open-source user-friendly web-platform interface to produce a refined systems-based risk assessment output for stakeholders. It will include exposure, toxicity (sublethal, chronic), and risk of single and multiple pesticides at individual, population, and community level across landscapes and land-use scenarios.
We developed new protocols for monitoring pesticide impact, extending the novel methods for lab-based testing of pesticide on wild bees to a higher diversity of wild pollinators (18 species so far). We determined the ecotoxicology and toxicokinetic of major pesticides and their mixtures across 11 pollinator species of bees, hoverflies and butterflies in laboratory conditions, and of two species in semi-field conditions. WildPosh is also improving MALDI PolTyping®, which is a laboratory tool to monitor pollinator health through simple, non-lethal, field-collection of a pollinator’s hemolymph. We expect that this approach will become a fundamental component of future global solutions for health management plans for pollinators, and become a referenced, fast, cost-effective and automatable analytical procedure to demonstrate the presence of stressors.
We are compiling a comprehensive open-source database about distribution and about traits, which includes morphological/ecological traits reflecting the sensitivity of European pollinators to pesticides and other stressors (e.g. nutrition, climate, parasite). Combining both databases will inform about the risk to pesticide exposure. In this way, WildPosh will be able to define traits associated with sensitivity to pesticides, thereby identifying sensitive ‘umbrella’ species whose protection will benefit the broader community of pollinators. We are additionally building a database to include information on pesticide use, as well as on other stressors able to amplify the adverse effects. In this way, we develop an open-source curated database on pollinators and the use of pesticides.
We are critically reviewing all existing prediction methodologies (QSAR models, category approach, read-across), identifying the most important gaps and sources of uncertainty and will propose improved strategies for increasing their ability to predict risk, facilitating the regulatory acceptance of in silico methods and their integration the ERA process. Moreover, we will develop methodologies for risk assessment in open-source tools. WildPosh will integrate existing and newly created data and models into an open-source user-friendly web-platform interface to produce a refined systems-based risk assessment output for stakeholders. It will include exposure, toxicity (sublethal, chronic), and risk of single and multiple pesticides at individual, population, and community level across landscapes and land-use scenarios.