Abstract
Workers in a wild in situ colony of the dwarf honey bee, Apis florea, were observed undertaking the following behavior: liquid foraging, pollen foraging, guarding, stinging, fanning and wagging abdomen. Bees of each behavioral class were separately collected and frozen. Collections were made over a period of 10 days. Random samples of brood and workers were also collected. DNA was extracted from each bee and “fingerprinted” using a probe of unknown sequence obtained from an A. mellifera genomic library. Patterns of fingerprints (Fig. 1) were dissimilar among behavioral classes (Tables 1 and 2), strongly suggesting a genetic component to division of labor in this species. This result supports similar findings in A. mellifera in a species that is not troubled by many of the experimental difficulties inherent in A. mellifera.
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Correspondence to: B.P. Oldroyd
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Oldroyd, B.P., Sylvester, H.A., Wongsiri, S. et al. Task specialization in a wild bee, Apis florea (Hymenoptera: Apidae), revealed by RFLP banding. Behav Ecol Sociobiol 34, 25–30 (1994). https://doi.org/10.1007/BF00175455
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DOI: https://doi.org/10.1007/BF00175455