At the Faculty of Science, Charles University, a bee identification course is currently taking place as part of the European Pollinator Identification Courses (EPIC) project. The training is coordinated by Jakub Straka from the Department of Zoology. Its aim is to teach participants how to identify individual bee genera and species so that they can subsequently monitor the status (abundance and species diversity) of pollinators. The project is part of the EU's ambitious commitment to reverse pollinator decline by 2030.
Could you explain to the readers what is the aim of the European Commission tenders called EPIC (European Pollinator Identification Courses)?
One component of the EU regulation on nature restoration is the so-called "restoration". The aim of the regulation is to return individual habitats to nature and increase species diversity. The effectiveness of these measures then needs to be measured in some way. There are, of course, several metrics, and one of them is monitoring pollinator populations. For the EPIC projects, moths, butterflies, hoverflies, and bees were selected as important groups of pollinators.
The EPIC project should thus be the first phase of training people who will deal with pollinator monitoring. At the moment, the capacity for a high-quality monitoring within the EU is very limited. In some countries, the situation is somewhat okay, but in many, there is no one with the necessary knowledge and experience. The EPIC projects will be followed by pollinator monitoring across the entire EU, which will be quite demanding and labor-intensive.
The project is overseen by the University of Mons in Belgium, which won the tender for the project from the European Commission. The entire project is divided into several regions, each with its own coordinator. You are the coordinator of the bee-related project (EPIC Bee) for Central Europe. What is your role in the project, and what are your tasks?
I am the coordinator for the Central European region, which is fairly large and includes Austria, Germany, Czechia, Slovakia, Hungary, Poland, and Romania. Together with the organizational team, we are responsible for coordinating and teaching the training courses (the identification courses), in our region. The total training capacity in basic courses is approximately 24 people (two training courses of 12 participants each) and in a follow-up intermediate courses it is 36 people (three courses of 12 participants), so the number of participants per country is quite limited. We have prioritized countries like Slovakia, Hungary, and Romania, where there are currently no bee experts, and we try to give them more space than participants from other countries. Interest from Germany, Austria, and Czechia is quite high, so unfortunately, we can’t accommodate everyone.
Who are these courses intended for, and what will the participants learn?
Participants are selected in two ways. Each country has a coordinator who helps select participants. At the same time, the governments or ministries of individual countries nominate participants. After discussions with coordinators and potential participants, we select who will be included in the course. Preference is given to those who plan to participate in the monitoring that will follow the project.
Primarily, it’s people from practice with an interest in bees or people who work in entomology but need to improve their bee knowledge. Often, they are also students who don't feel suited to an academic career and see pollinator monitoring as a way to engage in nature conservation and as a potential career opportunity. Since member states are obliged to carry out and fund the monitoring, it should work out that way.
This week, the first basic course is taking place at the Faculty of Science. What will participants learn during it, and how does the course work?
Before the course training began, we did about five rounds of online courses to explain the absolute basics. Participants with no prior knowledge essentially have no chance of learning everything in a one-week course. Ideally, they already know the basics or have some experience but lack proper training. During the training, they can then repeat and practice everything thoroughly.
In the basic course, participants learn to use a key to identify bees by genus. The key used in the training was created by the University of Mons. It was developed as part of a previous European project, so it’s freely available. Like other keys, it contains many imperfections and pitfalls, and our goal is to point them out. That way, when participants use it on their own, they'll know what to focus on and what to be cautious about.
Participants have representatives from each genus at their disposal (always a male and female, as they sometimes look very similar, and other times very different) and learn to use the key to identify genera. The more skilled participants will learn to recognize distinct representatives “by eye,” meaning they’ll be able to identify them even without the key. It’s clear that participants vary widely—some try to recognize bees even without the key, while others are just glad to make it through the key at all. During the course, participants’ skills improve significantly. Overall, I’ve been pleased with the interest of the participants so far.
We’ve also planned two days in the field. We’ll be catching bees, and then participants will process the caught material and identify it under the microscope.
Where will you be catching bees, and what will participants try out in the field?
One of the project’s goals is to train participants to recognize genera directly in the field while catching. But that’s quite difficult. Some people already have an overview and the necessary knowledge, but certainly not all participants. At the very least, all participants will see various approaches to catching bees.
Today (Tuesday – editor’s note), we’ve planned to catch bees in the Botanical Garden of the Faculty of Science using the standard transect method. In transects, a predetermined route is walked, and bees are caught with a net. You have to walk the route continuously and can only stop to process caught bees. In our group, we haven’t used this method much because I believe a lot of bees are missed with it. If a person isn’t well-trained, they usually miss the small species. Not to mention that small bees often fly low in the vegetation, so they’re almost impossible to catch with a net.
On Wednesday, we plan to catch bees on Petřín Hill, where participants will also see other collection methods that won't be used in monitoring. For example, bowl trapping, where colored bowls filled with water, salt, and a drop of detergent are used. The color attracts insects, and they fall in. Because of the detergent, the water immediately enters their tracheae, and the insects drown. Without detergent, the insects would float and potentially escape.
In the selected localities, we’re aiming for high abundance to catch a sufficient number of bees. These two sites also have relatively good genus-level diversity. Participants should definitely see Andrena, Anthophora, Lasioglossum, Megachile, Osmia and a number of other genera – in short, the basic genera, which is crucial for us. Surprisingly, the Botanical Garden might have better species than Petřín. The spectrum is quite uneven, but there are, for example, bellflower specialists and species specialized on yellow loosestrife.
Isn’t it a bit paradoxical that monitoring will be done using a method that can’t cover a large portion of species?
It is paradoxical, and I actually don’t like the proposed monitoring method very much. The transect method should be used mainly for two reasons. First, there is a general effort in monitoring to reduce killing. That’s commendable, but most bees still need to be caught and killed for identification. Some, like the honeybee and a few common species, can be recorded and released. The second reason is to reduce the amount of collected material, because for many countries, processing such large amounts of trapped material would be impossible.
For bees, we will probably have very limited transects, where we’ll only be able to catch bees within a meter of our position. That’s very little—especially considering I have a 1.5-meter-long net and then also my arms. Some people complain that even with transects, they get 6,000 individuals from one collection. Then the question is where the sample comes from. If it's from Lithuania or Denmark, where diversity is negligible, maybe they’ll only have three species. If someone knows how to do it, they can sort it into three piles in an hour. But for example, the Greeks will catch fewer individuals, yet they’ll have maybe a hundred different species selected from 900 possible bees in that area. And there are still undescribed species, and they’re supposed to identify them to species level. That’s completely beyond anyone’s capability.
The courses you organize are basic, intermediate, and advanced. Logically, it would seem that participants go through all three, but that’s not exactly the case. Could you explain how it works?
There really are three types of courses – basic, intermediate, and advanced. In 2025, two basic courses will take place in the Czech Republic. One is happening now, and the second will be at the beginning of September. But each region can do it differently. For example, in the Bulgaria-Greece-Cyprus region, the coordinators are from the Netherlands, and they hold each training in a different country. We considered this too, but it’s easier for us to organize it in the Czech Republic (in Prague and Hradec Králové) and gather all participants in the center of our region. It’s great that if participants can’t get funding from their sending institution, we can cover their travel and accommodation. The course itself is funded by the EU.
Advanced courses will follow the basic ones later in 2025. These are for training the trainers who will then teach the intermediate courses. The advanced course training is coordinated by Belgium and will cover bee diversity across all of Europe. The lecturers for these advanced courses must have a good knowledge of groups and species from across Europe. I, along with Michael Mikát (also Department of Zoology, Faculty of Science, Charles University) and Petr Bogusch (University of Hradec Králové), will teach some of the advanced courses and will also participate in others as trainees.
As for the intermediate courses, we don’t yet have a clear idea. We are currently working on species identification keys for all of Europe that will be used in the intermediate courses, which is quite demanding. Therefore, intermediate courses will take place in 2026 – one in Hradec Králové and two in Prague for the Central Europe region.
The project is divided into three parts – EPIC Bee (focused on bees), EPIC Fly (focused on hoverflies), and EPIC Butterfly (focused on butterflies). What role do experts from the Faculty of Science play in each part of the project?
In my research, I’ve long focused on bees, so my group and I are part of EPIC Bee. Besides me, Jaco Visser is a very important person in the EPIC Bee project, and my students Anička Žalmanová and Alžběta Voldřichová are also involved. Our team also includes colleagues from the University of Hradec Králové – Zuzana Bartíková and the already mentioned Petr Bogusch.
The team teaching the intermediate courses will be joined by Michael Mikát (Department of Zoology, Faculty of Science, Charles University) and Daniel Benda (Entomology Department of the National Museum and Department of Zoology, Faculty of Science, Charles University). In addition to teaching the intermediate-level courses, Daniel is responsible for preparing preserved specimens for course use and serves as the curator of the regional reference collection within the project.
Training is being conducted not only for bees but also for butterflies and hoverflies. In the Czech Republic, hoverflies are handled by Jiří Hadrava (also from the Department of Zoology, Faculty of Science, Charles University), and that training will take place next year. Butterflies are handled by colleagues from the Academy of Sciences in České Budějovice
Thank you for the interview!
Photos by: Jakub Straka, Jaco Visser, Zuzana Bartíková