decision support tools

To help beekeepers, growers, land managers and members of the public better assess the stressors that their managed and wild bee populations experience, we are developing a suite of decision support tools. These include tools to assess landscape quality for bees and other pollinators (Beescape and Beespatial), tools to evaluate local habitat quality for pollinators (PolliSense), tools to evaluate the attractiveness of floral resources for bees (FloralArea and FloraCount), and tools to evaluate the effects of landscape quality, weather and management on bee winter survival (BeeWinterWise). We are also developing automated, AI-enabled monitoring systems to evaluate insect populations in the field.

You can find more information about these tools through the Center for Pollinator Research’s Tools and Resources Page:

https://pollinators.psu.edu/resources-tools

And additional information can be found through the INSECT NET graduate training program page:

https://insectnet.psu.edu/research

Additionally, the Honey and Pollen Diagnostic Lab provided services for individuals interested in identifying the botanical sourses of honey and pollen collected by bees:

https://pollinators.psu.edu/research/the-penn-state-honey-and-pollen-diagnostic-lab

Figure from Beescape, July 2026

Selected References:

Li, K., Grab, H., Buckner, M.A., Houtman, L., Kammerer, M., McLaughlin, D., Ostroski, A., Douglas, M.R., Goslee, S.C., Khanna, V., Lonsdorf, E.V., Robinson, A.C., and C.M. Grozinger. “Beescape and BeeSpatial: Making multi-scale environmental indicators of bee habitat accessible across audiences” Environmental and Sustainability Indicators 31: 101381, https://doi.org/10.1016/j.indic.2026.101381 (2026)

Amoah, E.I., White, K., Patch, H.M., and C.M. Grozinger. "FloralArea: AI-powered algorithm for automated calculation of floral area from flower images to support plant and pollinator research" PLoS ONE 20(9), p.e0332165 https://doi.org/10.1371/journal.pone.0332165 (2025)

Houtman, L., Robinson, A.C., McLaughlin, D. and C. M. Grozinger. “Evaluating the usability and utility of a spatial decision support system for pollinator ecology” Ecological Informatics Volume 89, 103182, ISSN 1574-9541, https://doi.org/10.1016/j.ecoinf.2025.103182. (2025)

Gray, D., Goslee, S., Kammerer, M, and C.M. Grozinger. “Effective pest management approaches can mitigate honey bee colony winter loss (Apis mellifera) across a range of weather conditions in small-scale, stationary apiaries”. Journal of Insect Science, 24(3):15 (2024)

Prestby, T.J., Robinson, A.C., McLaughlin, D., Dudas, P.M., and C.M. Grozinger. “Characterizing user needs for Beescape: A spatial decision support tool focused on pollinator health” Journal of Environmental Management 325: 116416 https://doi.org/10.1016/j.jenvman.2022.116416 (2023)

Robinson, A.C., Peeler, J.L., Prestby, T., Goslee, S.C., Anton, K., and C. M. Grozinger. “Beescape: Characterizing User Needs for Environmental Decision Support in Beekeeping” Ecological Informatics 64: 101366 https://doi.org/10.1016/j.ecoinf.2021.101366 (2021).

Douglas, M.R., Sponsler, D.B., Lonsdorf, E.V. and C.M. Grozinger. “County-level analysis reveals a rapidly shifting landscape of insecticide hazard to honey bees (Apis mellifera) on US farmland”  Scientific Reports 10(1), 1-11. (2020)

Sponsler, D.B., Grozinger, C.M., Hitaj, C., Rundlöf, M., Botías, C, Code, A., Lonsdorf, E.V., Melathopoulos, A.P., Smith, D.J., Suryanarayanan, S., Thogmartin, W.E., Williams, N.M., Zhang, M.,  and M. R. Douglas. Pesticides and pollinators: a socioecological synthesis. Science of the Total Environment 662: 1012-1027 (2019).