Abstract

A well-documented population of honey bees on Gotland, Sweden is resistant to Varroa destructor mites and is able in some way to reduce the mite's reproductive success. The aim of this study was to determine the genetic and maternal contribution to the inheritance of the reduced mite reproductive success trait in this population. Four genotypic groups of colonies were established by crossing the mite-resistant population of Gotland with a mite-susceptible population in Uppsala, Sweden, through artificial insemination of reared queens with drone semen. All the colonies in groups with a genetic origin from the resistant population expressed reduced mite reproductive success regardless if the genetic origin was maternal, paternal or both, and no statistical differences were observed between the reciprocal crosses. These results strongly imply a dominant genetic component to the trait's inheritance, as opposed to maternal effects or epigenetic mechanisms, and that the trait can be easily produced through selective breeding using the mite-resistant Gotland bee stock.

Keywords

Varroa destructor; mite resistance; breeding; mite reproduction

Published in

Apidologie
2016, Volume: 47, number: 4, pages: 583-588
Publisher: SPRINGER FRANCE

SLU Authors

• Locke Grandér, Barbara

  • Department of Ecology, Swedish University of Agricultural Sciences
    

UKÄ Subject classification

Ecology


Publication identifier

DOI: https://doi.org/10.1007/s13592-015-0403-9

Permanent link to this page (URI)

https://res.slu.se/id/publ/78329