Environmentally-induced developmental effects on morphometric characters of workers in Apis cerana colonies.

摘要

Experiments were performed to tease out the possible effects of single and mixed-species colonies (Apis cerana and A. mellifera ligustica) on morphological development in A. cerana workers. The graph of principal components scores revealed three distinct morphological clusters: (A) A. cerana in A. cerana cells reared by A. cerana worker bees (cerana control group); (B) A. cerana in A. mellifera cells reared by A. cerana (cerana cell-test group); (C) A. cerana in A. mellifera cells reared by mixed A. cerana and A. mellifera (cerana test group), A. mellifera in A. mellifera cells reared by A. mellifera (mellifera control group) and A. mellifera in A. cerana cells reared by A. mellifera (mellifera cell-test group). It is shown that A. cerana worker bees larger in size than normal can be produced both by rearing them in larger cells and also by rearing them in mixed-species colonies..