Japanese honey bee

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Japanese honey bee
Japanese Honeybee Pollinating Japanese Apricot Blossoms (247564891) .jpeg

Japanese honey bee ( Apis cerana japonica )

Systematics
without rank: Bees (Apiformes)
Family : Apidae
Subfamily : Apinae
Genre : Honey bees ( apis )
Type : Eastern honey bee ( Apis cerana )
Subspecies : Japanese honey bee
Scientific name
Apis cerana japonica
Radoszkowski , 1877

The Japanese honey bee ( Apis cerana japonica , Japanese : ニ ホ ン ミ ツ バ チ Nihon mitsubachi ) is one of the eight subspecies of the Eastern honey bee, according to Engel . It is native to Japan and is also used there in beekeeping . Analysis of mitochondrial DNA has shown that it is closely related to bees from the Korean Peninsula .

description

Apis cerana japonica is slightly smaller than most of the subspecies of Apis mellifera . The abdomen shows four yellow horizontal stripes. The colony strengths are weaker than those of the western honey bee . The harvest is between 6 kg / per year from block hives and up to 20 kg / per year from magazine hives. Apis cerana japonica is considered to be very gentle and resistant to Varroa mites.

distribution

The Japanese honey bee is specified exclusively for the island world of Japan. Their distribution ranges from the north of Shimokita-gun on Honshū via Shikoku and Kyūshū to the small island of Ukejima, which belongs to Amami-Ōshima, in the south. The subspecies is missing on Hokkaidō , the northernmost of the Japanese main islands.

Taxonomy

The eastern honey bee ( Apis cerana ) was described by Johann Christian Fabricius in Entomologia systematica as early as 1793 . The Japanese subspecies was originally described as Apis mellifica var. Japonica by the Polish entomologist and Hymenoptera specialist Oktawiusz Radoszkowski in his work Hyménoptères de Korée in 1887.

The division of the Eastern honeybee Apis cerana into subgroups is difficult and controversial between different scientists. Traditionally, it is based on the comparison of different morphological body dimensions, especially the wings, which are then offset against each other using morphometry . Phylogenomics , the determination of relationships based on the comparison of homologous DNA segments, has emerged as a new method in recent years . Since the different lines of the Eastern honeybee split up only a relatively short time ago and are therefore genetically very similar to each other, only the mitochondrial DNA is used for this, as this varies more. Here, too, the different lines were mostly found to be closely related, with the haplotype Japan1 , to which 98.5% of Japanese bees belong, dominating in most of the Asian mainland. Usable differences can only be found in the non-coding sections of the mtDNA, which change the fastest.

The subspecies japonica is one of the 11 typologically differentiated by Maa 1953 and one of the four by Ruttner 1988 morphometrically differentiated. In 1999, Michael S. Engel assumed eight subspecies of the Eastern honey bee. Studies by Sarah E. Radloff and colleagues found such a large overlap when comparing morphometric measurements that they completely advised against differentiating between subspecies. The classic Apis cerana japonica was part of a complex (“Morphocluster I”, or “Northern cerana ”), which also included animals from China, Korea, the Russian Far East, Northwest India, Pakistan and Afghanistan. The animals from Japan and Korea formed a more weakly demarcated japonica subcluster. The genetic analyzes also showed that the bees from Japan, Korea and the Russian Far East are closely related. Some researchers continue to argue that the detectable genetic and morphological differences, while small enough, are large enough to warrant subspecies status. According to the results, it is likely that the species colonized the Japanese islands via Korea, as this is where the genetic similarity is greatest and greater than to animals from Taiwan, Hainan or mainland China. A minimum of 180 kilometers by sea have to be overcome. Using the methods of the molecular clock , a divergence time of around one million years has been estimated.

Beekeeping in Japan

Beekeeping is already mentioned in the Nihon Shoki , which was completed around the year 720 and is the first of the six official stories of the empire ( Rikkokushi ). The hives used in the Edo period were similar to the “folk hives” developed in Europe by Abbé Émile Warré . Western honey bees were first introduced to Japan in 1877 . Today some of the beekeepers in Japan work with the western honeybees. By contrast, over 2000 Japanese beekeepers use the native Japanese honeybees. Some beekeepers try to combine the keeping of the western honey bee with the Japanese one. Honeycombs with capped brood from the japonica peoples are hung in the western peoples. The hatching young bees recognize brood infested with Varroa mites in the colony and clear them out.

The so-called heat ball of the Am japonica against hornets
The result: two killed hornets of the species Vespa simillima xanthoptera

Defensive behavior

In contrast to the European bee Apis mellifera, Apis cerana japonica has developed effective prevention against hornet attacks by the Asian giant hornet as well . If Japanese honeybees discover a hornet scout, they signal with a tremor in their abdomen that a counterattack should be initiated. Several hundred bees then pounce on the hornet in a flash and let their flight muscles vibrate. In the ball-shaped swarm around the hornet, a heat sphere forms with an internal temperature of over 45 ° C. The hornet dies, while the bees can endure temperatures of up to 50 ° C for a short time due to a different metabolism . More recent studies assume that the increased CO 2 concentration in the heat sphere also contributes to the death of the hornets.

The Cypriot bee uses a similar defense strategy against the oriental hornet . Studies have shown that the Cypriot bees block the hornet's vital breathing holes so that the hornet suffocates.

literature

  • Friedrich Ruttner : Natural history of honey bees. Franckh Kosmos Verlag, Stuttgart.

Web links

Commons : Apis cerana japonica  - collection of images

Individual evidence

  1. ↑ a b Michael S. Engel: The taxonomy of recent and fossil honey bees (Hymenoptera: Apidae: Apis). Journal of Hymenoptera Research (1999) 8. (Eng.)
  2. ↑ a b Rustem A. Ilyasov, Junhyung Park, Junichi Takahashi, Hyung Wook Kwon: Phylogenetic Uniqueness of Honeybee Apis Cerana from the Korean Peninsula Inferred from Mitochondrial The, Nuclear, and Morphological Data. Journal of Apicultural Science (2018) 62 (2): 189-214. doi: 10.2478 / JAS-2018-0018 (engl.)
  3. ↑ a b Jun-ichi Takahashi, Tadaharu Yoshida, Toshiyuki Takagi, Shin'ichi Akimoto, Kun S. Woo, Sureerat Deowanish, Randall Hepburn, Jun Nakamura, Mitsuo Matsuka: Geographic variation in the Japanese islands of Apis cerana japonica and in A. cerana populations bordering its geographic range. Apidologie (2007) 38 (4): 335-340. doi: 10.1051 / apido: 2007018 (engl.)
  4. ↑ H. Randall Hepburn, Deborah R. Smith, Sarah E. Radloff, Gard W. Otis: Infraspecific categories of Apis cerana: morphometric, allozymal and mtDNA diversity. Apidologie (2001) 32 (1): 3-23. doi: 10.1051 / apido: 2001108 (engl.)
  5. ↑ Sarah E. Radloff, Colleen Hepburn, H. Randall Hepburn, Stefan Fuchs, Soesilawati Hadisoesilo, Ken Tan, Michael S. Engel, Viktor Kuznetsov: Population structure and classification of Apis cerana. Apidologie (2010) 41: 589-601. doi: 10.1051 / apido / 2010008 (engl.)
  6. ↑ Warré-like beekeeping in Japan (Engl.), Accessed on January 13 of 2019.
  7. ↑ German Professional and Acquisition Beekeepers Association DBIB: Report from Japan , January 2013, accessed on January 13, 2019.
  8. ↑ M. Ono, T. Igarashi, E. Ohno, M. Sasaki: Unusual thermal defense by a honeybee against mass attack by hornets (Vespa mandarinia japonica). In: Nature . 377, pp. 334-336. (engl.)
  9. ↑ Ball of insects: The heat death of hornets in bees. Spiegel online from March 15, 2012.
  10. ↑ Michio Sugahara, Fumio Sakamoto: Heat and carbon dioxide generated by honeybees jointly act to kill hornets. Natural Sciences, September 2009, Volume 96, Issue 9, pages 1133–1136. (engl.)
  11. Jump up ↑ Agnès Rortais, Georgia Zafeiridou, George Theophilidis, Lionel Garnery, Andreas Thrasyvoulou, Gérard Arnold: Smothered to death: Hornets asphyxiated by honeybees. Current Biology (2007) Volume 17, No. 18. (Eng.)