Most beekeepers are familiar with the mite species Varroa destructor which has devastated the beekeeping industry across the globe (with Australia the one remaining country free from the species). However, there is a closely related (yet less well-known) species named Varroa jacobsoni whose traditional host has been the Asian honey bee (Apis cerana). Unfortunately, a recent study in Papua New Guinea by the CSIRO found that a population of V. jacobsoni had been able to swap hosts and was now able to reproduce on the brood of the European honey bees (Apis mellifera) in that country. My honours research project for ...
American Foul Brood (AFB) and European Foul Brood (EFB) are two serious bacterial diseases which affect the honeybee. They are both highly contagious and can rapidly lead to the death of a colony. Signs of the diseases include discoloured and irregular brood (shown below). You will also start to see a dramatic decrease in hive activity as these diseases will kill off most of the larvae. [caption id="attachment_706" align="aligncenter" width="550"] American Foul Brood (AFB) infected frame[/caption] Although they exhibit similar symptoms, the ability of AFB to form spores makes it the worse of the two infections, as the spores are impervious to ...
Over the mid-year break I spent a month in Dr Taketoshi Kiya's laboratory at Kanazawa University in Japan. During my time in the lab I assisted Hiroki-san: a master's student utilising the honey bee as a model organism. The goal of the experiment (the methodology may be found here) was to use the proboscis extension reflex of the honey bee to study what biological factors influence long and short term memory. The proboscis extension reflex refers to the reflex reaction a bee will have to extend its mouth-parts (proboscis) when the antennae are stimulated. The pictures below show how we ...
Since I completed the grant proposal for my project in March, I’ve spent a lot of time working with Dr. Bruce Halliday from the CSIRO. Throughout this time I’ve learned a lot about mite biology and slide mounting techniques. I’ve been mounting the mites on slides so that I can make a comparison between both [...]
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Most beekeepers are familiar with the mite species Varroa destructor which has devastated the beekeeping industry across the globe (with Australia the one remaining country free from the species). However, there is a closely related (yet less well-known) species named Varroa jacobsoni whose traditional host has been the Asian honey bee (Apis cerana). Unfortunately, a [...]
Read more
Over the mid-year break I spent a month in Dr Taketoshi Kiya’s laboratory at Kanazawa University in Japan. During my time in the lab I assisted Hiroki-san: a master’s student utilising the honey bee as a model organism. The goal of the experiment (the methodology may be found here) was to use the proboscis extension [...]
Read more
