Abstract
Simple SummaryThe western honey bee is one of the most economically and ecologically important species currently facing serious challenges in its whole area of distribution. The honey bee is a highly diverse species with about 30 subspecies that are adapted to regional climate factors, vegetation, pests and pathogens. The local populations of honey bees are rapidly changing and their diversity is constantly manipulated by beekeepers through the import of foreign queens, selection and migratory beekeeping. This manipulation may lead to such changes that honey bees lose their ability to thrive in the areas that were previously suitable for their wellbeing. To see how this human interference changed the genetic variability of native honey bee populations from Serbia, we sequenced part of the mitochondrial genome and compared them with published sequences. Our results suggest that human influence significantly changes the natural composition of honey bees in Serbia and that the presence of some previously reported subspecies could not be confirmed.Local populations of Apis mellifera are rapidly changing by modern beekeeping through the introduction of nonnative queens, selection and migratory beekeeping. To assess the genetic diversity of contemporary managed honey bees in Serbia, we sequenced mitochondrial tRNAleu-cox2 intergenic region of 241 worker bees from 46 apiaries at eight localities. Nine haplotypes were observed in our samples, with C2d being the most common and widespread. To evaluate genetic diversity patterns, we compared our data with 1696 sequences from the NCBI GenBank from neighbouring countries and Serbia. All 32 detected haplotypes belonged to the Southeast Europe lineage C, with two newly described haplotypes from our sample. The most frequent haplotype was C2d, followed by C2c and C1a. To distinguish A. m. carnica from A. m. macedonica, both previously reported in Serbia, PCR-RFLP analysis on the COI gene segment of mtDNA was used, and the result showed only the presence of A.m. carnica subspecies. An MDS plot constructed on pairwise FST values showed significant geographical stratification. Our samples are grouped together, but distant from the Serbian dataset from the GenBank. This, with the absence of A. m. macedonica subspecies from its historic range of distribution in southern Serbia, indicates that honey bee populations are changing rapidly due to the anthropogenic influence.
Highlights
The western honey bee (Apis mellifera Linnaeus, 1758) is considered to be the most important managed pollinator species [1] native to the Old World (Africa, Asia and Europe) due to human activity, it is spread through all continents except Antarctica [2]
Since no restriction sites were observed after RFLP analysis, and we could not detect the presence of a specific haplogroup that was previously reported in southeast parts of Serbia, we presume that all individuals in our sample belong to A. m. carnica (Figure S1)
Results of PCR-RFLP analysis could not confirm the presence of specific A. m. macedonica mtDNA lineage due to the absence of a distinct restriction pattern previously described for this subspecies [32,39] suggesting that all sampled individuals belong to A. m. carnica mitochondrial lineage
Summary
The western honey bee (Apis mellifera Linnaeus, 1758) is considered to be the most important managed pollinator species [1] native to the Old World (Africa, Asia and Europe) due to human activity, it is spread through all continents except Antarctica [2]. Long time human companions, cannot be considered as fully domesticated species since their mating system is not under complete beekeepers’ control [8], and queens mate in several flights with multiple drones in drone congregation areas [9,10] Despite this still preserved mating autonomy, managed and feral honey bees colonies are under a strong anthropogenic influence [11]. Commercial breeding, along with the intensification of migratory beekeeping and queen importation, and as well as selection for desired traits, considerably influence the natural diversity and distribution range of honey bees [4,11] This human interference usually results in hybridization and population admixture [12,13,14,15], but can lead to depletion of genetic variability and local adaptations [4]. A high density of beehives per km and a small number of feral colonies, European honey bee populations are prone to hybridization and population admixture [15,17,18] resulting in a considerable degree of genetic admixture among subspecies [19,20,21]
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