Abstract:
In Ethiopia, the need for pesticides in improved agriculture is increasing but unwise application it has a subsequent effect on honeybees. Hence, the study was aimed to assess beekeeping and pesticide application practices and to identify the toxicity of pesticides on honeybee (Apis mellifera bandasii) at Lemo district, Hadiya Zone, Southern Ethiopia. Questionnaires were organized to collect survey data. Toxicity of pesticides were identified using laboratory via feeding, contact and vapor test. Multi-stage purposive sampling technique was used and two hundred forty-five respondents (140 beekeepers and 105 non-beekeepers) from seven kebeles were interviewed using semi-structured questionnaire. Key informant interviews and focus group discussion were undertaken. The survey data were analyzed by SPSS version 22.0. While, mortality of bees was analyzed using one-way analysis of variance (ANOVA) employing Procedure of SAS version 20. Accordingly, beekeeping was mostly traditional using traditional hives. The mean honey yield of traditional, transitional and frame hive were 4.53±0.76, 6.20±1.14 and 9.83±1.08 kg per hive per year, respectively. About 45% of the respondents applied pesticides to their crops during bees’ active foraging times. On sprayed fields, 53.6% of the beekeepers found dead bees, while, 28.6% of beekeepers faced the problem of absconding bee colony. Among the respondents, 74.7% of them could not understand instruction and labels written on packages and bottles of pesticides. All pesticides (Malathion, Mancozeb, Pallas, Zura, Richway and Ridomil) used in different tests (feeding, contact and fumigation) were significantly (P<0.05) toxic from negative control treatment. The mean Lethal Dose (LD50) of Malathion was less than 0.1μl/bee and having 100% mortality of experimental bees, which indicate the highly toxic category. The mean LD50 of Pallas, Mancozeb and Zura were 7-8μl/bee, 7.5-8μg/bee and 6-7μl/bee, respectively which indicate the moderately toxic, whereas Richway and Ridomil were 11-12μg/bee and 10-11μg/bee respectively which indicate slightly toxic to honeybee. The finding of this study concluded that, Pesticides application occurred during the optimal honey bee foraging activities hence the honeybees have great chance to be exposed to pesticides and respondents had low awareness on safe handling and disposal of empty containers with low use of safety precautions. Hence, less persistent pesticides like Richway and Ridomil used by farmers and applied in the evening when bees were not flying. Besides, training of smallholder farmers on integrated pest management, empty container and packages handling should be given.
