Abstract
The Asian hornet (Vespa velutina) has rapidly become a source of stress for the beekeeping sector. Several methods have been developed to control its impact and spread, though some of these impose a high risk for native insects. Among these methods are electric harps, which are physical barriers that electrocute hornets pass through two wires powered by a current generator. Here we evaluated the selectiveness and risk of damage for local entomofauna of the electric harps in a study carried out over three years and four locations in Girona province (NE Catalonia, Spain). The electric harps showed a high selectiveness, with 90.5% of all insects trapped (3331 individuals) catalogued as Asian hornets, although this greatly varied over years and locations with values ranging from 29.9 to 94.3%. The risk of damage to electric harps for local entomofauna was very low in all surveyed areas and years. Native insects, excluding domestic honey bees, accounted for, as a mean, 1.2% of all insects trapped over the study period (range 0–2.4%). Our results suggest that electric harps might be a useful environmentally-friendly method aiming to reduce predation pressure of the Asian hornet at beehives.
Acknowledgements
We would like to thank the Solà-Morales family (Batet de la Serra) and Manel Simón (Falgons) for letting us install the hives on their properties. We are also grateful to two anonymous reviewers whose comments helped to improve the manuscript.
Disclosure statement
No potential conflict of interest was reported by the author(s).
Data availability statement
Raw data employed for data analyses and figures can be found at the following link: https://doi.org/10.6084/m9.figshare.22116779.