DOI: 10.5061/dryad.n02v6wx8s
title: Common herbicide impairs fertility but not survival in bumblebees, <em>Bombus impatiens</em>

description: Insect declines have raised concerns over widespread agrochemical usage.
 Current environmental risk assessments (ERAs) focus on lethal effects,
 often neglecting fitness-relevant parameters. Our results demonstrate that
 chronic exposure of male bumblebees to a field-realistic level of a
 glyphosate-based herbicide significantly enhanced their survival yet
 reduced living spermatozoa ( 34%). This highlights a physiological shift,
 where resources appear prioritized toward survival mechanisms over
 reproductive investment. Such findings underscore critical false negative
 results in current ERAs and advocate for incorporating reproductive
 fitness endpoints to better understand and mitigate ongoing insect
 declines.
description: # Common herbicide impairs fertility but not survival in bumblebees,
 *Bombus impatiens* Dataset DOI:
 [10.5061/dryad.n02v6wx8s](10.5061/dryad.n02v6wx8s) ## Description of the
 data and file structure The following files are for the Scientific
 reports: Common herbicide impairs fertility but not survival in
 bumblebees, *Bombus impatiens* The R file is the statistical code used in
 the manuscript, and is commented throughout the entire file.  The two csv
 files are: 1.    Brown_et_al_2025-Bombus_impatiens.csv
 2.    Brown_et_al_2025-Bombus_impatiens-Sperm.csv The first file
 "Brown_et_al_2025-Bombus_impatiens.csv" contains 9 columns of
 data: 1.     TreatmentName: categorical data for the treatment names of
 the dataset 2.     Treatment: categorical data for the treatments of the
 dataset (in binary format, where 1 = control, 2 = herbicide 3.    
 Cagetype: the types of cages used in the experiment, either type 6 =
 hoarding, or type 1 = individual 4.     Age(Full) : Mortality data for
 bees which were followed throughout their entire lifecycle (time expressed
 in days) 5.     Age(ten) : Mortality data for bees subject to only 10 days
 of experiments (time expressed in days) 6.     Dailyconsumption: Amount of
 sucrose (in g) consumed / day / bee 7.     Status(full) : binary column
 for Kaplan Meier Analysis (1 = dead, 0 = censored) 8.     Status(Day10) :
 binary column for Kaplan Meier Analysis (1 = dead, 0 = censored), for the
 10 day experiment 9.     Treatment+CageType : column which describes both
 the cage type (type 6 = hoarding, type 1 = individual), and their
 corresponding treatment "control" or "herbicide".  The
 second dataset "Brown_et_al_2025-Bombus_impatiens-Sperm.csv"
 contains 7 columns of data: 1.     TreatmentName: categorical data for the
 treatment names of the dataset 2.     Exposure : binary column of 0 = no,
 1 = yes , for exposure to the treatment 3.     GlyphosateExposure :
 calculated exposure rate / bee / treatment to glyphosate (ng/bee) 4.    
 Day : refers to two sample time points: day 3, day 10 5.     Body Mass
 Start : the starting body mass of each individual bee (in grams) 6.    
 Viability: sperm viability (%) / sample 7.     Quantity: number of sperm
 quantified from a  hemocytometer / sample The r-code, entitled
 "Final_Brown_E_E_Glyophosate_Analysis.R" uses both datasets and
 indicates which one is needed for each analysis   ### Files and variables
 Please see  "Description of the data and file structure" for
 full description of each dataset, each column, and the R file used for
 data analysis. ## Code/software The code was done in R, and is found in
 "Final Brown E&E Glyophosate Analysis", and is commented
 directly in the code file. ## Access information Other publicly accessible
 locations of the data: * NA Data was derived from the following sources: *
 Taken in our laboratory at the Institute of Bee Health, Liebefeld
 Switzerland