Genetic analysis of honey bee defensive behavior components: Guarding and stinging
Abstract
This study was conducted to (1) identify variation components in the expression of guarding behavior between defensive and gentle backcross colonies, (2) study the role of guards in the defensive response of a colony, (3) test for the effect of three stinging behavior quantitative trait loci (QTLs) (sting-1, sting-2 and sting-3) on guarding and stinging behaviors of individual bees and (4) detect binary trait loci (BTLs) that influence guarding behavior of individual bees and locate genetic markers that are associated with these BTLs on two genetic maps. Reciprocal backcross colonies were derived from a gentle colony and a defensive colony. Differences, partially genetic in origin, were found for the number of bees that guard for at least one day and for at least two days in these colonies. A small proportion of the bees that stung were guards, and only a small proportion of the guards stung. Positive correlations were found between the number of stings and both the number of guards in the colony and the proportion of guards that stung. Colonies responded with fewer stings when guards were removed from the hive in comparison to when guards were present in the colonies. Samples of guards, stingers, foragers and nurse bees were taken from two of the backcross colonies. The genotype of each sampled bee was determined for two sequence tagged site (STS) markers linked to sting-1 and for another two STSs, one linked to sting-2 and one linked to sting-3. Sting-1 had an effect on both stinging and guarding behaviors, sting-2 and sting-3 affected only guarding behavior. Genetic maps were constructed with the samples of guards from the two backcross colonies. In the gentle backcross 130 markers were incorporated into 21 linkage groups that span 1230 cM and in the defensive backcross 133 markers were incorporated into 23 linkage groups that span 1513 cM of the honey bee genome. Ten markers were found to be associated with guarding behavior based on a Chi-square test. Five were detected in the gentle backcross and five in the defensive backcross. The ten markers represented seven putative BTLs influencing guarding behavior.
Degree
Ph.D.
Advisors
Hunt, Purdue University.
Subject Area
Entomology|Genetics
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