[Pollinator] Fwd: Native honeybee in Yunnan

[Peter Bernhardt]

Dr Ren Zong-Xin is my research colleague at the Botanical Institute in
Kunming.  He has a particular interest in the pollination biology of
traditional medicinal species as a large proportion of the species in the
Chinese pharmacopeia are now in cultivation.  Here are his recent thoughts
and photos of beekeeping, Apis cerana, in his hometown.  Please note that
A. cerana is NOT a domesticated species in Yunnan, or any other part of
China.  Local people go into the forest and remove colonies of this species
just as the Mayans in southern Mexico and Guatemala continue to remove
colonies of Melipona.  In Yunnan forests A. cerana appears to prefer to
nest in oaks.   Please look at the bee on the yellow brassica flowers.
 Considering the long antenna isn't that a drone or are we looking as some
other, native, Eucera-like species?

It is my hope that Professor Ren will join NAPPC. He completed field and
lab work on several Native American wildflowers while "post-docking"  in my
lab in 2013.

Peter

---------- Forwarded message ----------
From: 任宗昕 <renzongxin at mail.kib.ac.cn>
Date: Sun, Mar 9, 2014 at 9:20 PM
Subject: Native honeybee in Yunnan
To: Peter Bernhardt <bernhap2 at slu.edu>
Cc: "Robert A. Raguso" <rar229 at cornell.edu>, Justin Zweck <jzweck at slu.edu>,
Mike Arduser <Michael.Arduser at mdc.mo.gov>, Retha Meier <rmeier3 at gmail.com>,
Peter Kevan <pkevan at uoguelph.ca>



Dear Prof. Bernhardt,

I took some photos of domesticated hives of native Chinese honeybee in my
hometown, a small and peaceful village in Lijiang, northwestern Yunnan. In
this area, I didn't find any common western honeybee.

The local native honeybee keepers locate their hives around the houses,
usually in yard or in vegetable garden. In the first picture you can see
four hives in a vegetable garden (some garlic and brassica), the hives are
located in the hollow oak trunks and well rain/water protected. Plastic bag
cover the hives, it also keep the hives warm at winter time. The exist of
hive is covered by cow poop mixed with mud, I don't know why they did this.

Best,

Zong-Xin




--

*********************************
Zong-Xin Ren, PhD

Post Doc. Department of Biology, Saint Louis University, USA
Germplasm Bank of Wild Species, Kunming Institute of Botany, Chinese
Academy of Sciences,
132, Lanhei Road, Kunming, Yunnan 650201, P. R. China
Tel: +86－871-5223534
Fax: +86－871-5217791
E-mail: renzongxin at mail.kib.ac.cn

http://renzongxinorchid.weebly.com/
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