Observation of Genetic Gain with Instrumental Insemination of Honeybee Queens

Abstract

Controlling mating in the honeybee (Apis mellifera) is part of one of the greatest challenges for the beekeeping industry’s genetic selection programs due to specific characteristics of their reproduction. Several techniques for supervising honeybee mating with relative effective control have been developed over the years to allow honeybee selection. As part of this project, we compared the genetic gains for several colony performance traits, obtained using the BLUP-animal method, according to the selection pressure applied in controlled reproduction (directed fertilization versus instrumental insemination). Our results show similar genetic gains for hygienic behavior and honey production between colonies whether queens were fertilized naturally or via instrumental insemination, as well as similar or lower genetic gains for colonies with queens inseminated for spring development. In addition, we noticed greater fragility in queens following insemination. These findings show that instrumental insemination is an effective tool for reproductive control in genetic selection and for estimating breeding values more precisely. However, this technique does not result in queens of superior genetic quality for commercial purposes.

Determination of the Effect of Live Weight on Various Quality Parameters of Commercially Reared Queens (Apis mellifera L.) in Turkey

“…Many factors affect queen quality, including genetic and environmental factors. Genetic characteristics are transferred to worker bees through the queen and the drones that mate with her [11,12]. Therefore, the most important factor affecting the quality of the queen bee is its genetic material.…”

Uncertainty in the mating strategy of honeybees causes bias and unreliability in the estimates of genetic parameters

“…The alternative, artificial insemination, enables greater mating control. In particular, drones used to mate a virgin queen can be taken from a PS composed of very few sister-DPQs or even from a single DPQ (for example in [ 4 ]). In the latter case, this is referred to as single sire (SS) mating.…”

Comparison of pooled semen insemination and single colony insemination as sustainable honeybee breeding strategies

“…One approach is to take all drones to inseminate a queen from the same colony (but generally from different colonies for different queens) [ 11 , 15 , 25 , 26 ]. We call this strategy single colony insemination (SCI).…”

“…Since then, insemination techniques have been greatly improved and turned into a practicable tool for honeybee breeding [7][8][9]. Nevertheless, in most parts of the world, the actual practice of instrumental insemination is still concentrated at research institutes and has only limited influence on commercial honeybee breeding [9][10][11]. The small impact that instrumental insemination has had on practical breeding is juxtaposed by a host of scientific studies suggesting this form of mating control to constitute a viable breeding strategy [8,[11][12][13][14][15].…”

“…Nevertheless, in most parts of the world, the actual practice of instrumental insemination is still concentrated at research institutes and has only limited influence on commercial honeybee breeding [9][10][11]. The small impact that instrumental insemination has had on practical breeding is juxtaposed by a host of scientific studies suggesting this form of mating control to constitute a viable breeding strategy [8,[11][12][13][14][15]. To our knowledge, presently Poland is the only country to maintain large-scale honeybee breeding programmes that rely primarily on instrumental insemination.…”