About this Research Topic

Background

The giant honeybees compose an ancient subgenus (Megapis) with several forms in Asia. The lowland form, Apis dorsataFabricius, 1793, is widespread from Pakistan to eastern Indonesia, with geographic variants (species?) in the Philippines and Sulawesi. The highland form, Apis dorsata Smith, 1871, occurs in the southern valleys of the Himalayas and Pan-Himalayan region, from northern India to Vietnam, where it sometimes nests at elevations higher than 3500m. At intermediate elevations the two species occur sympatrically. Giant honeybees build their nests outdoors, attaching combs at their upper edges to rocky outcrops, horizontal tree branches, or even suitable man-made structures such as water towers or facades of houses. The descriptor "giant" of these honeybees refers both to their large body size relative to other honeybees, and to their massive single-comb nests, which may span horizontally more than two meters and hold 100,000 bees. The nests often occur in aggregations, sometimes with as many as 300 nests at a single site. The nest consists of a central comb covered with a bee “curtain” consisting of several layers of female worker bees. This configuration of nest members protects the nest from mechanical disturbance by wind and weather, and actively prevents access to nest resources by predators. Defense strategies range from mimetic coloration to the use of repellent physical signals to counter-attacks by a sting-ready rapid reaction force.

Giant honeybees are a special and important subject of research. Although they still remain largely unknown even among biologists worldwide, they play a key role in evolution and in some aspects represent an archetype of the otherwise commonly known European honeybee. After all, giant honeybees are highly adapted to their range to cope with ambient temperatures that drop to freezing in the winters of the subtropical montane zones and extreme heat and intense sunlight in lowlands nearer the equator. They survive heavy storms and tropical downpours, sometimes also fires and, above all, seasonal food shortages. Early in their evolution, giant honeybees developed a broad spectrum of communication forms that probably exceeds that of most other eusocial insects in diversity, perhaps due to their open-nesting habit. They show a clearly graduated and thus highly adapted set of defense strategies, above all their shimmering behavior, which appears to be unique in the entire animal kingdom and has a sophisticated defense function, especially against wasps. Their lifestyle also includes collective abilities to exploit niches of food sources spurned by other species. They are even able to adapt to the seasonally scattered floral resources by undertaking long-distance migrations. These bees have remained wild, resisting any attempt to domesticate them for beekeeping.

The aim of this Research Topic is to inspire authors who have experience with giant honeybees in the wild, to cover the range of questions and goals with their observations and studies. The topics addressed in this collection are intended to cover a broad spectrum. Behavioral analyses will probably take up the largest part of the contributions. They may comprise colony structure and nest architecture, defense behavior at the individual and collective level, and the collective transmission of information within the bee colony. They may address questions about migration regarding clarification of migration routes, what information is conveyed during migration dances, and lifespan of individuals and its likely dependence on season and migration. A central question is how honeybees can keep their nest interior homoiothermic during the hot times of day. How do they ventilate their nest interior? What is the role of the mouth zone, which forms an interface between the interior and exterior of the nest when the weather is favorable for foraging? It must be taken into account that practically all collective tasks are primarily controlled by principles of self-organization. A wide range of questions may address systematics and reproduction (e.g. what mechanisms isolate the two giant honeybee species?) and genetics, general physiology, as well as pathology and parasitology. Finally, issues related to the environment and conservation may be addressed, to shed light on the effects of human activities on the giant honey bees.

Keywords: Giant Honeybees, Apis Dorsata, Open-Nesting Style, Colony Aggregation, Bee Curtain, Shimmering Behaviour, Nest Ventilation, Lowland and Highland Species, Synanthropy

Important note: All contributions to this Research Topic must be within the scope of the section and journal to which they are submitted, as defined in their mission statements. Frontiers reserves the right to guide an out-of-scope manuscript to a more suitable section or journal at any stage of peer review.

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