Apiculture types of honey bees and life cycle

It deals with types of honey bees its life cycle.

1. APICULTURE – TYPES OF HONEY BEES AND LIFE CYCLE Dr. S. N. Bhalerao Associate Professor Department Of Zoology Anantrao Pawar Arts, Commerce & Science College, Pirangut , Tal. Mulshi , Dist. Pune

2. Classification Kingdom Animalia Phylum Arthropoda Class Insecta Order Hymenoptera Family Apidae Genus Apis Honeybee Classification

3. Honey bees are social, flying insects, lives in a colony. Honeybees has long straw like tongue to suck the nector. The hive of honeybees consist of a Queen bee, few Drones and thousands of Worker bees. Thus they show a Polymorphic colony organization. Honey bees collect nector and pollen from flowering plants. Honey is stored in Honey cells prepared by worker bees by braking Sucrose into Glucose and Fructose by regurgitation. Once the cell gets filled, it is capped with Bee wax. INTRODUCTION

4. Types of honey bees Apis dorsata (Rock bee ) Apis indica (Eastern bee ) Apis mellifera (European bee ) Apis floera (Garden bee ) Dammer Bee

5. Apis dorsata (Rock bee)

6.   It is the largest honeybee. Found all over the Indian sub mountainous region.   Builds single large open comb on high branches of trees and rocks.   Produces large quantity of honey, approximately 30 to 35 kg per year. This bee is ferocious, stings may cause fever and sometimes even death. Thus it is difficult to domesticate and rear. These bees shift their colonies quite often. Apis dorsata (Rock bee)

7. Apis indica (Eastern bee)

8.  These bees are larger than   Apis florae  but smaller than   Apis mellifera (medium sized).   Hive consists of several parallel combs in dark places such as cavities of Tree, Trunks, Mud walls, etc.  It produces honey about 6 to 8 kg per year per colony. This bee is not so ferocious and can be domesticated. These are more prone to swarming and absconding. These are native of India/Asia. 2. Apis indica (Eastern bee)

9. Apis mellifera (European bee)

10. 3. Apis mellifera (European bee )   These bees are also similar in habits to Indian bees, which build parallel combs. These are bigger than all other honeybees except  Apis dorsata .   The average production of honey per colony is 25-40 kg/colony. These bees b uild single small combs in bushes, hedges, etc . They have been imported from European countries. These bees are less prone to swarming and absconding .

11. Apis florea (Garden bee)

12.   These bees gets easily domesticated . They build single vertical combs. They also construct comb in open of the size of palm in branches of bushes, hedges, buildings, caves, etc . They produce about half a kilo of honey per year per hive. Their rearing is difficult, as they frequently change their place. The size of the bees is smallest among four  Apis   species described and smaller than Indian bee. They distribute only in plains. 4. Apis floera (Garden bee)

13. Besides the true honey bees, there are two species of stingless or Dammer bees, A.   Melipona   B.   Trigona   These bees occur in our country in abundance. These bees are much smaller than the true honey bees. They build irregular combs of wax and resinous substances in crevices and hollow tree trunks. The stingless bees have the importance in the pollination of various food crops. It can be domesticated, but the honey yield per hive per year is very less approximately 100 gm. 5. Dammer Bee

14. Castes of Honeybees There are three types or castes in a Bee colony- 1.Queen 2.Workers 3. Drones

15. The Queen B ee Unique member in colony and is a diploid, fertile female. The size of the body of queen is much larger than other castes of bees in the colony. It has a defense organ called sting at the tip of the abdomen that helps in egg-laying / ovipositor. Queen lays eggs for about 1000 to 1500 eggs per day. It lives for about two to three years.

16. The QUEEN BEE

17. The Worker bee It is a diploid, sterile female and smallest in size but in majority in a bee colony. They collect nector, pollen and produce royal jelly. They raise larvae and young ones. They clean the comb , produce wax, construct the beehive, defend and protect the hive. They clear the debris and the dead bees and maintain the temperature of the hive.

18. WORKER BEES

19. Types of Worker Bees Nurse workers:  Serve the queen with royal jelly, larvae and drones with honey and beebread. House workers:  They perform house cleaning, comb building, accepting nectar and pollen from foragers and also guard the hive. Field workers:   Travel to distant places to collect nector, pollen grains from flowers and resin from the trees.

20. The Drone Bee It is haploid, fertile male and born out of unfertilized eggs in the brood chamber. The males are larger than workers, quite noisy, have large wings, robust body, reduced mouthparts and are unable to gather food. They voraciously eat food fed to them by the worker bees, stingless, their sole function is to fertilize queen during nuptial flight and then they starve to death. The number of drones in a colony varies from 200 to 300 , develops parthenogenetically from unfertilized eggs and live only for a short period of time.

21. DRONE BEES

22. Bee Colony Honey bee nest is called Bee Hive or Comb. An average sized bee colony consists of 30 to 50 thousand bees . There are three types of individuals in a colony, the Queen, W orker and Drone . Number of workers bee decides the colony as termed ‘weak’ or ‘ strong’ Due to the existence of several morphological forms, bees are said to be a polymorphic species.

23. Honey bee has two sexes Male Female (Has two Castes) Drones Queens Workers The males or Drones are larger than the workers and are stingless. These Drones are present only in early summer. The workers and queens have stingers. Only Queen bee is capable of laying eggs.

24. Eggs laid by Queen bee hatch in three days to develop into larvae, known as grubs. Grubs are fed royal jelly, later future queens are continued on diet. Fully grown grubs transform into pupae. Queens emerge in 16 days, Workers in about 21 days (on average), and Drones in 24 days. The old q ueen typically leave the hive by the time the new queen emerges. Honeybee Life Cycle

25. Eggs laid by Queen are either unfertilized or fertilized. Unfertilized eggs develop into drones. Fertilized eggs develop into females, which may be either workers or virgin queen. Eggs destined to become queen are deposited in queen cells and are fed on  royal jelly. Those not fed diet consisting solely of royal jelly, develops into workers .

26. HONEY BEE CELLS

27. HONEY BEE EGGS IN HIVE

28. HONEY BEE LARVAE

29. HONEY BEE ADULTS