Join a conversation with John Muir Laws and Nina Sokolov where she describes the health of managed and wild bees in the US, and how you can help. Did you know that bees can get sick with viruses? Nina describes her research which focuses on the spillover of different viruses between managed honeybees and native wild bees in California. In addition to being a scientist, Nina is also an artist, and uses her observational skills to identify and illustrate the subtle differences between insect species.
Nina Sokolov is a Ph.D. candidate at UC Berkeley in Dr. Mike Boots’ lab studying disease ecology in bees. She is interested in understanding how crop pollination events such as the almond bloom impact viral dynamics in pollinator systems. Specifically, she works on ranches and in gardens throughout Marin County studying bee viruses through time to see how honeybee management impacts pollinator health. Additionally, she works in the Sierra studying virus dynamics in a subalpine wildflower pollinator system to understand the directionality of virus spillover between managed honeybees and native bees.
To see more of Nina’s illustrations, please check out her Instagram account: https://www.instagram.com/hawkwasp/
(June 2023)