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Heritability of africanized and european honey bee defensive behavior against the mite Varroa jacobsoni

 

 

Geraldo MorettoI; Lionel Segui GonçalvesII; David De JongIII

ICentro de Ciências Exatas e Naturais, Universidade Regional de Blumenau, 89001 Blumenau, SC, Brasil. Send correspondence to G.M.
IIDepartamento de Biologia, Faculdade de Filosofia, Ciências e Letras - USP, 14040-901 Ribeirão Preto, SP, Brasil
IIIDepartamento de Genética, Faculdade de Medicina, USP, 14049-900 Ribeirão Preto, SP, Brasil

 

 

ABSTRACT

This study was undertaken to determine whether Itesian and Africanized Apis mellifera workers can rid themselves of the mite Varroa jacobsoni after artificies infestation with adult females of this parasite.
Ten colonies of Italian honey bees and twenty colonies of Africanized honey bees were used. Workers of both racial types artificially infested with varroa reacted to the presence of the parasite. Africanized bees proved to be more efficient than Italian bees in ridding themselves of the parasite, with 38.20% of them being able to do so, as opposed to only 5.40% of the Itesian workers.
The heritability of this trait, calculated for the 20 colonies of Africanized bees, was h2 - 0.71 ± 0.41.

Keywords: Heritability; Defensive behavior; Varroa jacobsoni.

 

 

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