Toolkit – Origins of Honey Bees
It is easy to think there is no need to know the origins of honey bees, but having a basic understanding will help explain why bees may have different characteristics.
Worldwide, there are ten species of honey bee, but there is only one, Apis mellifera, called the Western Honey bee, that colonised Europe, and the one that is kept by beekeepers.
It has long been thought that honey bees evolved from hunting wasps, then a discovery was made of a bee in Amber, extracted from a mine in Myanmar (published in 2006), that scientists believe proves that theory correct.
Fossil evidence of honey bees is sparse, so there is considerable conjecture amongst scientists, with two main theories regarding the origin, one Asia, the other Africa, although the former now seems to be favourite, before colonising Africa. As with other species expanding their range, they moved in different directions from there, forming what are termed “evolutionary lineages”, of which the four main ones where honey bees occur naturally are:-
- Africa (A)
- West and Northern Europe (M)
- South East Europe (C)
- Near and Middle East (O).
About 26-29 (scientists can’t agree!) sub-species evolved when they became isolated by natural barriers such as water, sand and mountains, with natural hybridised buffer zones between some of them.
The pure races that the UK and Ireland are most involved with are the native bee Apis mellifera mellifera, that are in evolutionary lineage M and the introduced Italian bee Apis mellifera ligustica and the Carniolan bee Apis mellifera carnica, both lineage C.
The link below shows the fossil that scientists believe shows that bees evolved from wasps
Bee Types and distribution and Origins of bees are two scientific papers.
“Honey bee origins, evolution & diversity”, although probably written in the 1990s is still relevant and important. As per the notes at the bottom, there is a little updated information
The “Honey Bee Family” is a well referenced document by Brian Dennis that describes different bee types and a little history of them. It is excellent to help teachers and beekeepers understand these differences.
