Apis florea

The dwarf honey bee (or red dwarf honey bee), Apis florea, is one of two species of small, wild honey bees of southern and southeastern Asia. It has a much wider distribution than its sister species, Apis andreniformis. First identified in the late 18th century, Apis florea is unique for its morphology, foraging behavior and defensive mechanisms like making a piping noise. Apis florea have open nests and small colonies, which makes them more susceptible to predation than cavity nesters with large numbers of defensive workers. These honey bees are important pollinators and therefore commodified in countries like Cambodia. Danish zoologist Johan Christian Fabricius first identified Apis florea in 1787. A. florea is a member of the Apis genus. The Apidae is a diverse family of bees including honey bees, orchid bees, bumble bees, stingless bees, cuckoo bees and carpenter bees. The name Florea is a personal name of Romanian origin. A. florea is native to southeast Asia, and therefore one of the most phylogenetically basal bees. This suggests that honeybees originated in this region, with A. florea being one of the oldest and potentially similar to ancestors; therefore its first appearance in phylogeny occurs before that of A. mellifera and A. cerena. A. mellifera most likely evolved from A. florea and then migrated to Europe. A. florea, a dwarf honeybee, is a sister species of Apis andreniformis. These sister species are the most ancient honeybee lineage, most likely diverging in the Bartonian era. A. florea is called the dwarf honey bee due to its small size compared to other honeybees. A worker is typically 7–10 mm in body length and its overall coloration is red-brown. A colony builds a single, exposed comb usually on tree branches or shrubs. A. florea produce honey that is harvested and eaten in Thailand and Cambodia. They are excellent pollinators, which gives them an important ecological role in the places they inhabit. Drones carry a thumb-like bifurcation called the basitarsus, which is located two-thirds along the length of the tibia. The fimbriate lobe of A. florea has three protrusions and they sting using two stylet barbs. Apis florea and its sister species together comprise the subgenus Micrapis, and are the most primitive of the living species of Apis, reflected in their small colony size, and simple nest construction. The exposed single combs are built on branches of shrubs and small trees. The forager bees do not perform a gravity-oriented waggle dance on the vertical face of the comb to recruit nestmates as in the domesticated Apis mellifera and other species. Instead, they perform the dance on the horizontal upper surface where the comb wraps around the supporting branch. The dance is a straight run pointing directly to the source of pollen or nectar the forager has been visiting. The distinctiveness of the two species A. florea and A. andreniformis was established unequivocally in the 1990s. A. florea is redder and old workers always have a red first abdomen (younger workers are paler in colour, as is the case in giant honey bees); A. andreniformis is generally darker and the first abdomen segment is completely black in old bees. Distinguishing characteristics of the dwarf honey bees are outlined below: A. florea spans the continents of Asia and Africa and is most commonly seen in Southeastern Asia (Thailand), the Northeastern part of India, China, and forested regions of the Middle East. A. florea reach a decision about a new nesting site via dancing. They decide on a site when the largest number of individuals dance in the direction of the new site. The workers use an auditory signal of piping to indicate a decision about a new site has been reached, with the top of the swarm lifting off into the air first, followed by the bottom of the swarm and then the middle reaching the air last, but all within one minute of the swarm’s initial lift off. Since dancing is a common mechanism of communicating about a new nesting site in both A. florea and A. mellifera, it is suggested that this form of nest site selection evolved in the common ancestor of Apis. However, A. florea do not re-evaluate a site before several individuals move to the new site like A. mellifera does. Instead, swarms travel to the new site as a group and leave to a new site if it is later discovered to be unsuitable. This makes searching for new sites a much faster process for A. florea, but not necessarily more accurate. Apis florea are found in southeastern Asian countries, especially in Thailand, Iran, Oman, India, Myanmar, and some parts of China, Cambodia, and Vietnam. They live in forest habitats but they are also pollinators of tropical fruit crops in Thailand. Apis florea build exposed nests always with a single comb on a single branch. If they are building a new nest near to the old one, they salvage the wax from the old nest. Other species of honeybee do not exhibit this behavior, perhaps because of the risk of contaminating pathogens. This behavior is only observed in this species. Even within the species this behavior differs, the colonies that migrate less than 200 meters engage in wax recycling, but the colonies that migrate longer distances do not. The annual colony cycle of honeybees involves migration, swarming, and absconding. A. florea migrate seasonally from one habitat to another. This might increase colony fitness, as the honeybees search for new territories, resources, or a reduction in parasites. Once a colony has outgrown its hive space, it will reproduce via swarming. During warmer seasons like spring and summer, ambient temperatures allow honeybees to forage actively, and they will reproduce frequently. During the colder seasons of autumn and winter, colonies diminish in size because they depend on food stores. Before swarming, the colony will build queen cells in order for virgin queens to rear young queens. Before the new queens emerge, the colony’s workers search for a new nesting site. Afterwards, the bees will choose who stays and who goes. Similar to absconding behavior, the old queen will swarm while the new queens prepare for emergence. In a single patriline, more workers mean the colony will produce more drones. High mating frequency in A. florea has been evolutionarily selected for as observed in other members of the genus. The average lifespan of a drone is 15.6 days, ranging from 6–41 days. The queen has a much longer lifespan consistent with the longevity of the colony. A. florea have workers that police to ensure that workers’ eggs are destroyed at twice the rate of queens’ eggs using oophagy. The queens’ eggs are marked as to avoid destruction by worker bees. Since this behavior is also observed in A. mellifera, this suggests that policing mechanism behaviors evolved before the divergence of the genus Apis.