Giant honey bee

Distribution

"Apis dorsata" is found from the Indian subcontinent to Southeast Asia. The greatest populations of "Apis dorsata" are found in China, Malaysia, Indonesia, India, Pakistan, and Sri Lanka.

Behavior

"Apis dorsata" utilizes what is known as a dance language, also known as waggle dance, to communicate the location of food sources to other bees in the colony. The dance language indicates the distance, profitability, and direction of the food source. These social bees dance in the open and their dances produce sound signals of high intensity in the air.

The orientation of the dancer’s body points in the direction of the food source; the frequency of the sound indicates the profitability of the food source. "Apis dorsata" produces silent dances, which usually involve visual cues during the day. They additionally produce sound with their dances in the nighttime, as they are the only bees of its genus that exhibit nocturnal foraging activity. Furthermore, there is some evidence that "Apis dorsata" dances for migration purposes as well. Bees that have returned from the new nesting site perform dances that alert the colony of information such as the direction of the new nesting site.

Habitat

These bees are tropical and in most places, they migrate seasonally. Individual colonies migrate between nesting sites during the transition from the rainy to dry seasons and occupy each nesting site for about 3–4 months at a time. Some recent evidence indicates these bees return to the same nest site, though most, if not all, of the original workers might be replaced in the process because workers usually live for less than two months. Furthermore, these bees build small combs that serve as temporary nests during their long migrations.

Reproduction

"Apis dorsata" differs from the other bees in its genus in terms of nest design. Each colony consists of a single vertical comb made of workers’ wax suspended from above, and the comb is typically covered by a dense mass of bees in several layers.

The nests vary in size, reaching up to 1 meter. Each cell within the comb is hexagonal in shape. "Apis dorsata" store their honey in an upper corner of the nest. The same size and type of cells are used to rear larvae. Nests are constructed in the open and in elevated locations, such as on urban buildings or tall trees. These bees rarely build nests on old or weak buildings for safety concerns. "Apis dorsata" can form dense aggregations at one nesting site, sometimes with up to 200 colonies in one tree.

Each colony can have up to 100,000 bees and is separated by only a few centimeters from the other colonies in an aggregation. Some colonies also exhibit patterns of nest recognition, in which they return to the same nesting sites post migration.

Predators

Since the nests of "Apis dorsata" are fairly exposed and accessible to predators, these giant honeybees exhibit strong and aggressive defense strategies. Their predators include wasps, hornets, birds, and human bee-hunters. Their defense strategies typically include physical contact, especially when they face attacks from wasps. These giant honeybees utilize a method called “heat balling,” in which they heat their thoraces to a temperature of 45 degrees Celsius

Another method that "Apis dorsata" utilizes against wasps is referred to as “shimmering” behavior or defense waving. Bees in the outer layer thrust their abdomens 90° in an upward direction and shake them in a synchronous way. This may be accompanied by stroking of the wings. The signal is transmitted to nearby workers that also adopt the posture, thus creating a visible — and audible — "ripple" effect across the face of the comb, in an almost identical manner to an audience wave at a crowded stadium. These wave-like patterns repel wasps that get too close to the nests of these bees and serve to confuse the wasp. In turn, the wasp cannot fixate on capturing one bee or getting food from the bees’ nest, so the wasp will seek to find easier prey and leave this nest alone. Shimmering appears to be an evolutionary successful behavior for group living amongst social bees.

Studies have also provided evidence that these bee colonies aggregate in defense. If one part of the nest is directly threatened by a bird, a signal gets relayed to the rest of the colony so that all of them help in the defense, even if they are not directly threatened.

Migration

As a colony is initiated, the migration depends on foraging resources and predation risks. These bees travel to different sites depending on the blooming season of flowers. There are about 100,000 members in each colony and each colony resides in one nesting site for about 3–4 months at a time. Colonies tend to decline when resources, such as food, honey, and pollen, are depleted. Colonies decline during the rainy and summer seasons because of the instability of foraging sources due to climate change.