The Effects of Instrumental Insemination on Selected and Unselected Breeding Characteristics in Honeybee (Apis mellifera L.)

Abstract

In this study, the effect of instrumental insemination and natural mating on selected and unselected characters in a breeding population was investigated. The experimental colonies were from a population that has been selected for 3 generations in terms of hygienic behavior. Honey yield, brood production, and adult bee population characters were not taken into consideration as a selection criterion. Mother queens and drone fathers were selected from the breeding population. While a significant difference was found between naturally mated queen (NMQC) and instrumentally inseminated queen colony (IIQC) groups in terms of hygiene behavior, there was no significant difference between the groups in terms of performance phenotypes. The average dead pupa removal was 84.44 +/- 0.87% in the NMQC; this average increased to 87.70 +/- 1.09% larvae/colony by the control of the father in IIQC usage. This result demonstrates that instrumental insemination can be used to produce colonies of equivalent phenotypes compared to open-mated queens.