There are two controversial views about the genetic composition of the Africanized honey bee in the Americas. One view reports that Africanized honey bees have spread by maternal migration of African swarms and the population has retained an African genetic integrity (Taylor 1985, Hall and Muralidharan 1989, Smith et al. 1989). The other one states that hybrid swarms have expanded throughout the Neotropics, leaving behind a hybrid feral population (Rinderer et al. 1985, Rinderer 1986). Despite these two contradictory perspectives of the Africanization process in the Neotropics, extensive hybridization between European and Africanized honey bees has been predicted in the United States.
In the present study, the temporal genetic interaction between European and Africanized feral honey bee feral, from Welder Wildlife Refuge (San Patricio County, Texas), was investigated using mitochondrial DNA and nuclear DNA (microsatellite) markers. A sample of honey bee workers collected across a continuous period of 11 years, encompassing pre and post-Africanization, were analyzed using 13 microsatellite loci and BglII restriction polymorphism of a region the cytochrome b gene. Estimates of gene frequencies and racial admixture of the Welder population through time is shown. These are the first results reported in the United States which address the hybridization question in feral honey bee populations.
Species 1: Hymenoptera Apidae Apis mellifera (Honey bee)
Keywords: africanized, hybridization
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