We can't deny the importance of honey bees when assisted pollination add-value reaches billions of
dollars every year in the united states alone. We depend on honeybees to get the nutrition we need,
I don't know about you but I like to eat well and stay healthy which makes the art of keeping bees
an important subject with a lot of competition. Beekeepers are in constant search of the perfect
honeybees. The perfect honeybee is the one with the right traits, with the best features to
make a beekeeper happy. High honey production oh yeah, gentle behavior, that'll be nice as well,
high tolerance to varroa mite infestation oh man that's the one. Basically, beekeepers are
looking for a mix of high productivity and immortality, which is kind of hard to get.
And in this video, I want to start a discussion about honeybee selection programs
giving emphasis to the selection of varroa mite-resistant honeybees. We will talk about
all documented traits found in different Apis mellifera populations either selectively bred
or naturally selected for resistance and tolerance to varroa mite parasitism. I have
no idea how many videos will take to cover all of that but one thing is for sure if at the end
of this video series you're not a subscriber. I don't know what I'm gonna think about you man.
if you're new here I'm dr Humberto Bonchristiani and this is inside the hive tv the show that takes
you into the world of bees, here we talk about honeybee research and the importance
of honeybees. If you like bees please consider subscribing to the channel and don't forget to
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the ectoparasite mite Varroa destructor is the most significant pathological threat to the
western honeybee Apis mellifera and still today the leading cause of death in honeybee colonies.
Since Varroa destructor has only shared a short coevolutionary history with Apis mellifera,
the European honeybee, very little is known about the relationship between this novel host
and the parasite. The jump of species from Varroa mite natural host of the Asian honeybee Apis
cerana to the European honeybee Apis mellifera occurred about 100 years ago and in evolutionary
time this is nothing. This is important to know because at this moment we have an unbalanced host
parasite relationship, there has been not enough time for evolution by natural selection to select
a balanced combination of Apis mellifera and Varroa destructor strains that can live together
harmonically. Also, we well-intentioned human beings, are constantly interfering with this
process and perhaps delaying the balance to happen. Honeybees have the world record for
genome recombination rate among all multicellular organisms and on top of that the honeybee queen
mates with dozens of drones, the male bee. In combination, this creates an incredible
genetic diversity inside the honeybee colony. This genetic diversity is the secret sauce of honeybees
to adapt and survive in many different conditions making them one of the most successful societies
in natural history. So it is clear that honeybees have the tools to survive this new threat alone
and they will not end up extinct. The problem is that to survive the new threat naturally a
new kind of bee will need to emerge from the selection process and, very likely these new
traits of this resistant bee might not go along with what the beekeepers need and desire. Some
beekeepers believe this is the way to go, leave the bees alone don't treat them with anything,
and let the new honey bee rises. Some beekeepers don't like the idea at all because the new honey
bee might not be a good fit for where they live or the business model they follow putting the
beekeeper's survivorship at risk. Where do you stand on that? Please leave a comment in
the comment section below. So beekeepers start to look for heritable honeybee traits for resistance
or tolerance to might throughout breeding programs or selecting for natural surviving
untreated colonies. This video is brought to you by our fans on Patreon if you want to get
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it took a while for researchers to start to search for these traits. Varroa mite was found in Apis
mellifera in 1949 for the first time in the old soviet union, then in Europe in 1967 in Bulgaria,
then in 71 in South America and in Paraguay, then in Africa in 1975 in Tunisia. The
studies looking for traits started after that in the 80s and increased over time as you can see in
this graph. Red shows when varroa mite was first found in France in 1982 the USA in 86 the UK in 92
New Zealand in 2000 and now unfortunately Australia in 2022. By the way, I will have
a special guest directly from Australia to talk about the discovery of a Varroa destructor in
Australia for the first time coming soon to the channel. Please sign up for my email list to get
more information about future live streams. Here you can see when studies start to happen
on naturally surviving honeybee Apis mellifera populations in purple and breeding programs
populations in pink from the natural survival site researchers start to look at African bees first
Apis Mellifera capensis and scuttelata, then they move to Africanized bees in South America.
From the breeding program side efforts start with observations from Yugoslavian bees showing varroa
mite resistant signs and even being imported to the united states in 1993 to be sold across the
country by queen breeders. So as you can see we have today several programs selecting honeybees
to resist Varroa mite parasitism in many parts of the world. In any genetic selection process,
you need a starting point. You need to know where to look at it, you need to know where you want to
select it, otherwise, you can't select something that you cannot observe and quantify. In the
beginning, to learn where they should be looking regarding varroa resistance traits, investigations
started on Apis cerana the original host to figure out the mechanism underlying a known well-balanced
host-parasite relationship we have in nature. Apis cerana was the place to go to learn how to
fight varroa might from nature itself. Basically, three heritable control traits were observed in
Apis cerana, grooming, reduction of varroa mite fertility, and varroa-sensitive hygienic behavior,
VSH. And these become the base for many breeding programs we have today. But the discovery of these
traits and the implication for future breeding programs around the world is the subject of the
next video, Until then please watch this video right here to learn more about bees subscribe
to the channel if you didn't already, and if possible support me on Patreon. It is great to
have you here thanks for watching inside the hive tv the show of all these see you guys next week