Hoarding Behaviour and Life Span of Inbred, Non-Inbred and Hybrid Honeybees

SummaryCaged groups of 50 newly emerged workers (Apis mellifera carnica) stored the sugar solution provided (and in other experiments honey) in empty comb in their cages. On average, non-inbred workers took the food significantly faster than inbred workers, and hybrid workers took it faster than inbred workers of their parental lines. These results are discussed with respect to earlier results showing a difference in recruiting ability between inbred and non-inbred colonies.On average non-inbred workers lived longer than inbred workers, and hybrid workers longer than workers from their parental lines.Implications are discussed of inbreeding depression and heterosis, for both hoarding behaviour and length of life of workers, in relation to the theory of genetic load in haplo-diploid systems.