Essential Fatty Acids: Powerful Key to Increase Brood.

Essential fatty acids play a key role in brood production and overall survival.

Fats, or lipids, are critical for honey bee health. A 2021 analysis found that all bee pollen substitutes lack the essential lipids: linolenic and alpha-linolenic fatty acids. Linolenic acid deficiency causes smaller hypopharyngeal glands and other detrimental effects on brood development and colony health. 

Evaluating new diets for honey bees, researchers Ricigliano and Simone-Finstrom found considerable amounts of functional lipids and sterols in microalgae spirulina. These findings indicated that Spirulina makes a better pollen substitute, which was confirmed in a published commercial beekeeper trial.

Additionally, green algae Chlorella is also rich in lipids, especially the essential linoleic and alpha-linolenic acids. Chlorella has the same ratio of linolenic to alpha-linolenic acid as pollen (8-to-10). This is important because a different ratio of the fatty acids can increase mortality and decrease brood rearing.

Now this research is easy to apply in your bee yard. BeeBites 15% Protein supplement is formulated with lipid-rich Spirulina and Chlorella for optimal honey bee nutrition and health. BeeBites provide nurse bees with the essential fatty acids necessary for hypopharyngeal gland development and brood rearing.

Spirulina and Chlorella Deliver what Traditional Pollen Substitutes Lack

Sources

Corby-Harris, V., Bennett, M.M., Deeter, M.E. et al. Fatty acid homeostasis in honey bees (Apis mellifera) fed commercial diet supplements. Apidologie 52, 1195–1209 (2021). 

Abstract – Honey bees obtain lipids from pollen or commercial supplements. These supplements do not fully support colony health. We tested the hypothesis that supplements are deficient because they lack essential fatty acids (EFAs). The five supplements we tested had low linolenic (⍵3) acid and were unbalanced (⍵6:⍵3 > 6) compared to natural pollen. We selected two of these supplements for further study because they had different levels of individual EFAs and different ⍵6:⍵3 ratios. Bees from hives fed these different supplements had equivalent tissue EFA levels. In choice assays, hives fed these different supplements were presented with flours with various absolute and relative levels of EFAs. We saw no difference in foraging preference. Rather, all hives preferred flours with small grain sizes and high protein-to-lipid ratios. We conclude that bees balance their internal EFAs and that differential colony nutrition does not affect foraging preference. The data also argue for more linolenic (⍵3) acid in commercial supplements.

Ricigliano, V.A., Simone-Finstrom, M. Nutritional and prebiotic efficacy of the microalga Arthrospira platensis (spirulina) in honey bees. Apidologie 51, 898–910 (2020). 

We evaluated the microalga Arthrospira platensis (commonly called spirulina), as a pollen substitute for honey bees. Nutritional analyses indicated that spirulina is rich in essential amino acids and a wide variety of functional lipids (i.e., phospholipids, polyunsaturated fatty acids, and sterols) common in pollen. Feeding bioassays were used to compare dry and fresh laboratory-grown spirulina with bee-collected pollen and a commercial pollen substitute using sucrose syrup as a control. Diets were fed ad libitum as a paste to newly emerged bees in cages (10–13 cage replicates) and bees were sampled at days 5 and 10 for physiological and molecular measurements. Spirulina diets produced biomarker profiles (thorax weight, head protein content, and beneficial gut bacteria abundance) that were indicative of elevated nutritional states, meeting or exceeding the other diets in some metrics despite reduced consumption. Furthermore, spirulina diets led to significantly increased fat-body lipid content and mRNA levels of the central storage lipoprotein vitellogenin. We conclude that spirulina has significant potential as a pollen substitute or prebiotic diet additive to improve honey bee health.

Lipidomic analysis of spirulina identified and quantified 13 subclasses of phospholipids (309 species), 3 subclasses of neutral lipids (447 species), and two subclasses of sterols (37 species). The lipid categories were obtained by summing the levels of individual molecular species within each type (Table I). The levels of each species are listed in detail in (Online Resource 2). Phosphatidylglycerol, sphingomyelin, and lysophosphatidylglycerol were the major phospholipid subclasses, accounting for 62.4% of the total lipids. The sterol content (sigmasterol + brasssicasterol) was 9.4%. The fatty acids 16:0, 18:2, 18:1, 18:0, 18:3, 20:0, 20:1, 20:3, 20:5, 22:2, 24:0, and 22:6 were predominant in the total esterified fatty acids (Online resource 2).

Stigmasterol 138.39 ng/mg (6.29%), Brassicasterol 68.39 ng/mg (3.11%).

Freitas, H.R. Chlorella vulgaris as a Source of Essential Fatty Acids and Micronutrients: A Brief Commentary. The Open Plant Science Journal 10, 92-99 (2017).

Polyunsaturated fatty acids (PUFAs) comprise about 35-40% of the total lipid content of green algae Chlorella, reaching up to 24% linoleic acid and 27% α-linolenic acid in C. vulgaris. Also, microalgae nutrient composition may be modulated by changes in the culture medium, increasing fatty acid and microelement concentrations in the algae biomass. PUFAs, such as α-linolenic (n-3) and linoleic (n-6) acids, as well as its derivatives, are considered essential for dietary consumption, and their ability to regulate body chemistry has been recently explored in depth. A balanced fatty acid consumption is shown to counteract the negative effects of Western diets, such as chronic inflammation and glucose intolerance. In this brief commentary, technological and practical uses of C. vulgaris are explored as a means to improve dietary quality and, ultimately, human health.

References

1. Corby-Harris, V., Bennett, M.M., Deeter, M.E. et al. Fatty acid homeostasis in honey bees (Apis mellifera) fed commercial diet supplements. Apidologie 52, 1195–1209 (2021). 

2. Ricigliano, V.A., Simone-Finstrom, M. Nutritional and prebiotic efficacy of the microalga Arthrospira platensis (spirulina) in honey bees. Apidologie 51, 898–910 (2020). 

3. Freitas, H.R. Chlorella vulgaris as a Source of Essential Fatty Acids and Micronutrients: A Brief Commentary. The Open Plant Science Journal 10, 92-99 (2017).