Publikasjoner
NIBIOs ansatte publiserer flere hundre vitenskapelige artikler og forskningsrapporter hvert år. Her finner du referanser og lenker til publikasjoner og andre forsknings- og formidlingsaktiviteter. Samlingen oppdateres løpende med både nytt og historisk materiale. For mer informasjon om NIBIOs publikasjoner, besøk NIBIOs bibliotek.
2026
Forfattere
Linn Vassvik Bjørn Arild Hatteland Erik Trond Aschehoug Anders Nielsen Anne Mathilde KnudsenSammendrag
Eple er Norges mest produserte frukt, likevel er de fleste eplene vi spiser importerte. Kan nye eplesorter og tilrettelegging for villbier øke produksjonen og derigjennom forbedre Norges selvforsyningsgrad?
Forfattere
Liv Guri VelleSammendrag
An overview of the European Heathland Network, its history, purpose and role in connecting research, management and policy across Europe. The presentation also highlighted past workshops, current management challenges and priorities for strengthening the network in the future.
Forfattere
Linn Vassvik Anders Nielsen Michael P. D. Garratt Bjørn Arild Hatteland Joseph Chipperfield Jørund Johansen Silje Maria Midthjell Høydal Erik Trond AschehougSammendrag
Insect pollinators are important drivers of fruit quality and yield in horticultural systems. The global reduction in wild bee populations has increased the demand for managed honeybees, despite honeybees relatively low pollination efficiency. Here, we assessed how bee communities, bee behaviour, and orchard design in Norwegian apple orchards affects apple pollination success, an important determinant of apple quality. We placed pan and vane traps in 18 apple orchards, in six distinct locations, within the two main apple growing regions in Norway. We also tracked individual bees (honeybees, bumblebees, and solitary bees) throughout the apple flowering season, and recorded their flower handling time, number of flower visits, stigma contact, and movement between apple flowers. Finally, we calculated the seed set rate (ovules developed into seeds / total number of ovules) from 908 harvested apples to estimate pollination success. Our key finding is that pollination success was driven by the abundance of wild bees and overall orchard planting design. We found lower pollination success in block design orchards where a single cultivar is planted continuously over a large area, compared to orchards with an integrated design where compatible cultivars are planted within the orchard. We also found that stigma contact decreased as apple flowering progressed, and that solitary bees visited fewer flowers per foraging event but were potentially more thorough foragers. Our results highlight the importance of promoting wild bees in apple orchards while also ensuring there is compatible pollen in the orchards for optimal pollination.
Forfattere
Linn Vassvik Anders Nielsen Michael P. D. Garratt Bjørn Arild Hatteland Joseph Chipperfield Erik Trond AschehougSammendrag
Apples are dependent upon pollinators for the transfer of pollen between cultivars to ensure high quality fruit production. Agricultural intensification has reduced the availability of stable floral resources for wild bees, leading to widespread declines of important pollinators of apples. Managed honeybees are commonly used to supplement pollination services in apple orchards, but honeybees are less efficient pollinators compared to wild bees. We investigated whether increased flower abundance in the understory vegetation of apple orchards can increase pollinator activity to apple flowers. We compared bee visitation in five orchards in Eastern Norway: three unmowed orchards, and two mowed orchards. In unmowed orchards, dandelions ( Taraxacum spp.) dominated the understory vegetation. Bee observations were conducted on the understory vegetation and apple trees, via manual observations and time-lapse cameras. Wild bees preferentially visited apple flowers over dandelions, while honeybees did not differ in their visits to apple flowers and dandelion flowers. We also found that the abundance of dandelion flowers in the understory increased visits by wild bees to apple flowers. Taken together, this suggests that within orchard floral resources do not compete for pollinators but instead increase apple visitation and improve pollination success. Our results highlight the importance of managing apple orchards for wild bee populations and the potential short-term benefits of understory floral resources on apple production. Implications for insect conservation Our results show that understory vegetation should be left unmowed to increase pollination of apple flowers and provide pollinators with alternate floral resources before, during, and after apple flowering.
Sammendrag
Bumblebees are keystone pollinators which facilitate the reproduction of a wide range of wild and agricultural plants. Their abundance and diversity have been severely reduced by anthropogenic stressors such as widespread land-use change and habitat fragmentation. However, we lack a comprehensive understanding of population structure and local adaptation in bumblebees inhabiting human-altered landscapes. Here, we discover significant fine-scale (e.g. ~300 km) population structure within two common bumblebee species, Bombus lapidarius and Bombus pascuorum, by analysing whole genome data of 106 specimens from 7 sites in northern Europe. While the observed population structure is largely associated with natural oceanic barriers, we also detect significant divergence between populations sampled from anthropogenic landscapes which are not separated by such barriers. Furthermore, whereas genetic divergence in B. lapidarius is spread relatively evenly across the genome, divergence in B. pascuorum is concentrated within several megabase-sized genomic regions—including a putative chromosomal inversion – which may underlie well-known colour polymorphisms across its range. Our observations reveal a distinct genomic architecture underlying population structure within these bumblebee species, and highlight the necessity of increasing our understanding of bumblebee connectivity to design optimal bumblebee conservation strategies.
Forfattere
Bolette BeleSammendrag
I regi av Nasjonalt Senter for Fjellandbruk, og i samarbeid med NLR, TINE, Norges Vel og NIBIO, ble det 19 august 2026, arrangert en Seterfagdag ved Maureggvollen i Endalen (Budalen), sør i Trøndelag. Seterfagdagene er finansiert av Nasjonale Fjellandbruksmidler, og inngår i et prosjekt som ledes av Nasjonalt Senter for Fjellandbruk. Bolette Bele deltok fra avdeling for Kulturlandskap og Biomangfold i NIBIO. Seterbrukerne innledet med historien og driften til setra og ga deltakerne en omvisning. NLR informerte ga råd i forhold til driften av innmarksarealet på setervollen, og kommunen orienterte blant annet om UKL, RMP, samt historien og dagens skjøtsel i utslåtten Blåora. NIBIO satte fokus på den immaterielle kulturarven, biodiversiteten, beitegrunnlaget i utmarka, samt terroir-effekter hos melk og melkeprodukter. Resultater fra prosjekter som NIBIO tidligere har hatt i seterdalene i Budalen ble presentert og diskutert med seterbrukerne og de øvrige deltakerne under markvandringen.
Sammendrag
This paper describes from a methodological point of view a recent attempt to test how Historic Landscape Characterisation (HLC) as developed with respect to the British landscape can be adapted and applied to the different and distinctive landscapes of a Norwegian upland territory, on the edges of the Hardangervidda plateau. This is an area characterised by mobility, close nature-culture interactions, and practices such as summer farming and short-distance transhumant practices. The research was carried out by two Norwegian agencies – NIKU and NIBIO – as part of a larger project known as PARKAS designed in the context of green transitions to promote better-integrated and publicly-responsible management and safeguarding of protected areas. We briefly describe the origins and principles of HLC in Britain, and then at greater length assess the suitability of HLC in Hardangervidda and key ways by which the approach would require modification and adaptation. A concrete method for a Hardangervidda HLC – and a suitable high-level classification – is identified and discussed.
Sammendrag
Semi‐natural grasslands are valuable habitat for bumblebees ( Bombus spp.) in Fennoscandia. These grasslands are often maintained by livestock such as free‐ranging sheep, but it is unclear if sheep grazing impacts bumblebee communities, and if so, which grazing intensity is best. We compared bumblebee species richness and abundance on semi‐natural grasslands in southeastern Norway at varying levels of disturbance by sheep (0–1680 initially released). We used Bayesian hierarchical models to test the intermediate disturbance hypothesis, that the highest bumblebee abundance and richness would occur at moderate grazing intensity, while considering other important habitat variables: distance to forest, meadow size, sward height, and availability of flowers, litter, and bare soil. We found no support for the intermediate disturbance hypothesis but rather a negative relationship between the number of sheep released and measures of bumblebee species richness and abundance from targeted netting. Effects varied among the most common species. B. pratorum and B. wurflenii were more sensitive to the number of sheep released than were B. jonellus . Bumblebee abundance estimated by two capture methods (blue vane trapping and targeted netting) was only weakly correlated and bumblebee species richness estimated from traps was unrelated to any of our predictor variables. Practical implication . Our results suggest a weak negative influence of any amount of sheep grazing on bumblebee abundance and richness. Targeted netting was a more reliable method than blue vane traps to assess effects on the bumblebee community.
Forfattere
Anaïs Zimmer Adrienne Grêt-Regamey Ignacio Palomo Carolina Adler Meryem Aakairi Marie Anière Fabien Anthelme Chloe Baruffa Bolette Bele Vincent Ralph Clark Aida Cuni-Sanchez Sebastian Eiter Richard Field WariNkwi Flores Katherine Hanly Jan Hartmann Amina Maharjan Sara Manuelli Dominic Andreas Martin Nelly Nambande Masayi Paula Mayer Graham McDowell Holly Moulton Anne Nolin Lydia Olaka Binaya Pasakhala Jorge Recharte Neema Robert Kinabo Luciana Rojas Hanne Sickel Lobzang Stanzen Peter John Taylor Irene Teixidor-Toneu Catherine Tucker Sabarnee Tuladhar Robert MarchantSammendrag
Det er ikke registrert sammendrag
Forfattere
Siri Vatsø Haugum Vigdis Vandvik Liv Guri Velle Daniel Fjørtoft Kristine Birkeli Jeanette TennebekkSammendrag
Vinteren 2026 hadde vi lange perioder med kaldt og klart vær langs store deler av norskekysten. Barfrost kombinert med lite nedbør og sol førte til tørkeskader på røsslyng mange steder. Omfanget er varierende fra sted til sted og hver enkelt lyngheibonde må derfor undersøke egne beitearealer for å forberede seg til vinteren. Her får du en oversikt over hvordan du kan skille mellom død og tørkeskadet lyng og hvilke tiltak du kan gjøre for å revitalisere lyngheibeitene og hvordan du kan sørge for nok mat til dyrene gjennom kommende vintersesong.