OECD 255 Bumblebee (Bombus spp.), Chronic Oral Toxicity Test (10-day Feeding)

The value of this test lies in its more comprehensive assessment of the risk to all pollinators, moving beyond a sole focus on honeybees to provide a more robust foundation for tiered risk assessment programs as testing scales from laboratory conditions to semi-field and field experiments.

To evaluate these potential long-term risks, a 10-day laboratory chronic toxicity study is essential. Positioned as the critical next step after acute toxicity tests (OECDs 246/247) and based on OECD 245 (chronic test on honey bees), this study exposes worker bumblebees to treated sucrose solution to evaluate chronic impacts.

The test is designed for the determination of the following endpoints:

🔹 LC50 (median Lethal Concentration) and the LDD50 (median Lethal Dietary Dose) values after 10 days of exposure.
🔹 NOEC (No Observed Effect Concentration) and NOEDD (No Observed Effect Dietary Dose).
🔹 Sublethal effects : behavioural abnormalities (recorded daily alongside mortality assessments).

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Next week we will talk about : Residue Studies in Honey and Other Bee Products