Queen production and instrumental insemination of Apis florea queens

Mananya Phiancharoen , Siriwat Wongsiri , H. Hepburn

Virgin queens of A. florea were produced in 10 queenless colonies yielding 106 queens with an average of 10.6 ± 2.99 queen cells per colony and a success rate of 65.23 ± 0.14% virgin queens. Spermatozoa were collected directly from the seminal vesicles. Thirty queens were inseminated, each with a pool of about 3.12 × 106 spermatozoa derived from 8 drones. Six queens began to lay eggs 5 to 14 days after instrumental insemination. The mean number of spermatozoa reaching the spermatheca of inseminated queens was 0.74 × 106 ± 0.45 (=24% of the drone's spermatozoa) and the percentage of worker offspring was 100% in 5 queens and 83% in one queen. This method opens the possibility for new studies in genetics and selective breeding.

Mots clés: Apis florea; queen production; instrumental insemination; spermatozoa; offspring

Domaines: Zoologie des invertébrés; Biodiversité; Ecologie, Environnement; Science des productions animales

Mananya Phiancharoen, Siriwat Wongsiri, H. Hepburn. Queen production and instrumental insemination of Apis florea queens. Apidologie, 2011, 42 (3), pp.307-311. ⟨10.1007/s13592-011-0068-y⟩. ⟨hal-01003604⟩