Techniques for the In Vitro Production of Queens in Stingless Bees (Apidae, Meliponini)

Abstract

Considering the ecological importance of stingless bees as caretakers and pollinators of a variety of native plants makes it necessary to improve techniques which increase of colonies' number in order to preserve these species and the biodiversity associated with them. Thus, our aim was to develop a methodology of in vitro production of stingless bee queens by offering a large quantity of food to the larvae. Our methodology consisted of determining the amount of larval food needed for the development of the queens, collecting and storing the larval food, and feeding the food to the larvae in acrylic plates. We found that the total average amount of larval food in a worker bee cell of F. varia is approximately 26.70 ± 3.55 µL. We observed that after the consumption of extra amounts of food (25, 30, 35 and 40 µL) the larvae differentiate into queens (n = 98). Therefore, the average total volume of food needed for the differentiation of a young larva of F. varia queen is approximately 61.70 ± 5.00 µL. In other words; the larvae destined to become queens eat 2.31 times more food than the ones destined to become workers. We used the species Frieseomelitta varia as a model, however the methodology can be reproduced for all species of stingless bees whose mechanism of caste differentiation depends on the amount of food ingested by the larvae. Our results demonstrate the effectiveness of the in vitro technique developed herein, pointing to the possibility of its use as a tool to assist the production of queens on a large scale. This would allow for the artificial splitting of colonies and contribute to conservation efforts in native bees.

An advance in the in vitro rearing of stingless bee queens

“…Although this survival rate increased later to around 50 %, several aspects of the technique still needed to be improved. The queens produced under in vitro conditions were smaller than natural queens (Hartfelder and Engels 1992;Baptistella et al 2012), and building of wax cells was very laborious. Besides that, it is not clear whether these in vitro queens were able to mate and lay eggs.…”

In vitro rearing of stingless bee queens and their acceptance rate into colonies

“…In vitro queen rearing of stingless bees is providing in the last years a great strength and practical potentiality (Baptistella et al 2012;Menezes et al 2013, this study). However, we have still In vitro rearing of bee queens dozens of stingless bee species kept in hives demanding more efforts and technology for a successful management (Cortopassi-Laurino et al 2006;Contrera et al 2011;Jaffé et al 2015).…”

“…Queen-rearing techniques for stingless bees are based mainly on the overfeeding of female larvae in vitro (Baptistella et al 2012;Menezes et al 2013), since castes determination system in most stingless bee genera depends mainly on trophic factors (Darchen and Delage-Darchen 1971). Female larvae destined to become queens receive more larval food in the bigger (royal) cells than female larvae destined to become workers reared in smaller brood cells (Darchen and DelageDarchen 1971).…”

“…To date, we have lesser than five stingless bee species with queenrearing techniques published like Frieseomelitta varia (Lepeletier), Scaptotrigona depilis (Moure) and S. Postica (Latreille) (e.g. Hartfelder and Engels 1992;Baptistella et al 2012;Menezes et al 2013). …”

Resposta comportamental de <i>Scaptotrigona depilis</i> (Apidae: Meliponini) aos estoques de pólen

“…Na maioria das espécies de abelhas sem ferrão, as rainhas são criadas em células reais, maiores em diâmetro e comprimento em relação às células de cria de onde emergem operárias e machos, e em baixa frequência (Imperatriz-Fonseca & Zucchi 1995;Santos-Filho et al 2006). A fim de contornar esse obstáculo, a criação in vitro de rainhas foi implementada (Menezes 2010) e resultados bemsucedidos têm sido obtidos para algumas espécies, como Frieseomelitta varia (Baptistella et al 2012), Plebeia droryana (Santos et al 2016), S. depilis (Menezes et al 2013) e…”