Institut für Nutztierwissenschaften

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    Insights into Ethiopian honey bee diversity based on wing geomorphometric and mitochondrial DNA analyses
    (2020) Hailu, Teweldemedhn Gebretinsae; D’Alvise, Paul; Tofilski, Adam; Fuchs, Stefan; Greiling, Juergen; Rosenkranz, Peter; Hasselmann, Martin
    Traditional beekeeping has been playing important socio-economic roles in Ethiopia for millennia. The country is situated in northeast Africa, where ranges of major evolutionary lineages of Apis mellifera adjoin. However, studies on the classification and distribution of subspecies and lineages of honey bees in the country are partly inconsistent, either proposing multiple subspecies and lineages or a unique A. m. simensis. This study was conducted with the aim of elucidating Ethiopian honey bees in reference to African subspecies and major global lineages using wing geometric morphometrics and COI-COII mitochondrial DNA analyses. For this purpose, 660 worker bees were collected from 66 colonies representing highland, midland, and lowland zones in different locations. Both methods indicated that the samples from this study form a distinct cluster together with A. m. simensis reference. In addition, forewing venation patterns showed that most of the Ethiopian samples are separate from all reference subspecies, except A. m. simensis. Analysis of COI-COII sequences revealed five DraI haplotypes (Y2, Y1, A1, and O5’), of which one was new denoted as Y3. Moreover, centroid size strongly associated with elevation. In conclusion, the results supported that Ethiopian honey bees are distinct both at lineage and subspecies levels; however, there is an indication of lineage O in the north.
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    Reproduction of Varroa destructor does not elicit varroa sensitive hygiene (VSH) or recapping behaviour in honey bee colonies (Apis mellifera)
    (2021) Sprau, Lina; Hasselmann, Martin; Rosenkranz, Peter
    Suppressed mite reproduction (SMR) is an important trait for the selection of Varroa resistant honey bee colonies. It has repeatedly been assumed that SMR is an effect of varroa sensitive hygiene (VSH) when hygienic bees preferably remove those brood cells where the mite has reproduced. We here compare the VSH behaviour of honey bees toward brood cells artificial infested with a varroa mite. By infesting half of the brood cells directly after the cell capping and the other half only 24 h later, we established two groups with high (> 75%) and low (< 2%) mite reproduction. After 8 days, about 40% of the infested brood cells were removed, however without any difference between both groups. Likewise, no group differences were recorded in the percentage of recapped brood cells. This strongly indicates that the presence of mite offspring is not a crucial trigger for the VSH behaviour. SMR data like the percentage of non-reproducing mites are therefore not the optimal measure for the selection of colonies with high VSH.