Apis florea in Jordan: source of the founder population
- Authors: Haddad, N , Fuchs, S , Hepburn, H Randall , Radloff, Sarah E
- Date: 2009
- Language: English
- Type: text , Article
- Identifier: vital:6844 , http://hdl.handle.net/10962/d1011047
- Description: A recent isolated population of Apis florea has been reported from Aqaba in Jordan at the Red Sea, consisting of numerous colonies within a still limited range which apparently is expanding. This region is about 1500 km apart from its next occurrences in Sudan where it had been introduced and first detected in 1985 and about 2000 km apart from its next natural occurrences in Iran and Oman. These bees apparently have been imported by human transport, most likely by ship. This new location thus represents a major jump in the progression of the species still to fill a wide area of possible locations offering adequate living conditions. Here we attempt to track the possible origin of this new population by morphometric methods. This analysis indicated closest relation to A. florea from Oman, thus being the most likely source of this population.
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- Date Issued: 2009
Intra- and interspecific brood recognition in pure and mixed-species honeybee colonies, Apis cerana and A. mellifera
- Authors: Tan, K , Yang, M-X , Radloff, Sarah E , Yu, Y , Pirk, Christian W W , Hepburn, H Randall
- Date: 2009
- Subjects: Apis mellifera Apis cerana
- Language: English
- Type: text , Article
- Identifier: vital:6837 , http://hdl.handle.net/10962/d1010962 , http://dx.doi.org/10.1051/apido/2009003
- Description: We studied the effects of mixed honeybee colonies of Apis mellifera and Apis cerana on the intraspecific and interspecific recognition of female brood stages in the honeybees A. cerana and A. mellifera by transferring brood combs between queenright colonies. In the intraspecific tests, significantly more larvae were removed in A. cerana than in A. mellifera, whilst significantly fewer eggs and pupae were removed in A. cerana than in A. mellifera. In the interspecific tests, A. cerana colonies removed significantly more larvae and pupae of A. mellifera than the same brood stages of A. cerana were removed by A. mellifera. We show there are highly significant differences in both intraspecific and interspecific brood recognition between A. cerana and A. mellifera and that brood recognition operates with decreasing intensity with increasing developmental age within species. This suggests that worker policing in egg removal is a first line of defense against heterospecific social parasites.
- Full Text: false
- Date Issued: 2009
Wax discrimination in the Lesser Honeyguide Indicator minor
- Authors: Hepburn, H Randall
- Date: 2009
- Subjects: To be catalogued
- Language: English
- Type: text , article
- Identifier: http://hdl.handle.net/10962/448440 , vital:74730 , https://doi.org/10.2989/OSTRICH.2009.80.2.11.838
- Description: Beeswaxes consist of complex mixtures of homologous neutral lipids that vary among species of honeybees but share many compounds in common (Aichholz and Lorbeer 1999). However, the beeswaxes of subspecies of the honeybee, Apis mellifera, can only be distinguished after careful calculation of the peak elution pattern area ratios of selected compounds (Brand-Garnys and Sprenger 1988). This is of interest in an ornithological context because honeyguides (Indicatoridae) subsist in large measure on the pillage of the combs of honeybees (Friedman 1955) and their enzymic capacity to digest beeswax has been demonstrated experimentally (Friedmann and Kern 1956, Diamond and Place 1988, Downs et al. 2002). Honeyguides can utilise olfactory orientation to find beeswax (Stager 1967, Archer and Glen 1969) and can even detect and seek out the combs of honeybees stored in hives devoid of bees in darkened out-buildings (HRH pers. obs.).
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- Date Issued: 2009