Abstract
Varroa destructor Anderson & Trueman (Varroa) is a damaging pest of the Western honey bee, Apis mellifera, in North America, Europe, and Asia. However, Varroa infestations have not produced equivalent colony losses of African subspecies of honey bee throughout Africa and parts of the Americas. We surveyed the Varroa infestation rates (number of Varroa per 100 adult honey bees) in colonies of A. m. scutellata, A. m. capensis, and hybrids of the two subspecies throughout the Republic of South Africa in the fall of 2014. We found that A. m. scutellata colonies had significantly higher Varroa infestations than did A. m. capensis colonies. Furthermore, hybridized colonies of the two subspecies had Varroa infestations intermediate to those of A. m. scutellata and A. m. capensis. This is the first documentation of a clear difference in Varroa infestation rates of A. m. scutellata, A. m. capensis, and hybridized colonies in South Africa. Furthermore, our data confirm that Varroa populations in A. m. scutellata colonies are within the range of populations that are damaging to European honey bees.
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Acknowledgments
We graciously thank Christian Pirk for assistance in coordinating field collections, the South African beekeepers who allowed us to sample their colonies, and Christopher Crockett for assistance with statistical analysis. ASTER Global Digital Elevation Model data product is courtesy of the online Data Pool at the NASA Land Processes Distributed Active Archive Center (LP DAAC), USGS/Earth Resources Observation and Science (EROS) Center, Sioux Falls, South Dakota (https://lpdaac.usgs.gov/data_access). Funding for this project was provided by the Florida Department of Agriculture and Consumer Services through guidance of the Honey Bee Technical Council.
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Mortensen, A.N., Schmehl, D.R., Allsopp, M. et al. Differences in Varroa destructor infestation rates of two indigenous subspecies of Apis mellifera in the Republic of South Africa. Exp Appl Acarol 68, 509–515 (2016). https://doi.org/10.1007/s10493-015-9999-8
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DOI: https://doi.org/10.1007/s10493-015-9999-8