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Stingless bees ( SB), sometimes called stingless honey bees or simply meliponines, are a large group of bees (from about 462 to 552 described species), comprising the tribe Meliponini (or subtribe Meliponina according to other authors). They belong in the family Apidae (subfamily Apinae), and are closely related to common (HB, tribe Apini), orchid bees (tribe Euglossini), and (tribe Bombini). These four bee tribes belong to the Pollen basket bees' Monophyly group. Meliponines have stingers, but they are highly reduced and cannot be used for defense, though these bees exhibit other defensive behaviors and mechanisms. Meliponines are not the only type of bee incapable of stinging: all male bees and many female bees of several other families, such as Andrenidae and Megachilidae (tribe Dioxyini), also cannot sting.
Some stingless bees have strong mandibles and can inflict painful bites. Some species can present large mandibular glands for the secretion of caustic defense substances, secrete unpleasant smells or use sticky materials to immobilise enemies.
The main honey-producing bees of this group generally belong to the genera Scaptotrigona, Tetragonisca, Melipona and Austroplebeia, although there are other genera containing species that produce some usable honey. They are farmed in meliponiculture in the same way that European honey bees (genus Apis) are cultivated in apiculture.
Throughout Mesoamerica, the Maya peoples have engaged in extensive meliponiculture on a large scale since before the arrival of Columbus. Meliponiculture played a significant role in Maya society, influencing their social, economic, and religious activities. The practice of maintaining stingless bees in man-made structures is prevalent across the Americas, with notable instances in countries such as Brazil, Peru, and Mexico.
The majority of native eusocial bees of Central America and South America are SB, although only a few of them produce honey on a scale such that they are farmed by humans. The Neotropics, with approximately 426 species, boast the highest abundance and species richness, ranging from Cuba and Mexico in the north to Argentina in the south.
They are also quite diverse in Africa, including Madagascar, and are farmed there also. Around 36 species exist on the continent. The equatorial regions harbor the greatest diversity, with the Sahara acting as a natural barrier to the north. The range extends southward to South Africa and southern Madagascar, with most African species inhabiting or both tropical forests and .
Meliponine honey is prized as a medicine in many African communities, as well as in South America. Some cultures use SB honey against digestive, respiratory, Eye and reproductive problems, although more research is needed to disclose evidence that supports these practices.
In Asia and Australia, approximately 90 species of stingless bees span from India in the west to the Solomon Islands in the east, and from Nepal, China (Yunnan, Hainan), and Taiwan in the north to Australia in the south.
The hypothesis proposes the potential dispersion of stingless bees from what is now North America. According to this scenario, these bees would have then traveled to Asia by crossing the Bering Strait (Beringia route) and reached Europe through Greenland (Thulean route).
The phylogenetic relationships among the four tribes of corbiculate bees have been a topic of considerable debate within the scientific community. Two primary questions arise: the relationship of stingless bees to honey bees and bumble bees, and whether their eusocial behavior evolved independently or from a Common descent. Morphological and behavioral studies have suggested that Meliponini and Apini are sister groups, indicating a single origin of higher eusociality. In contrast, molecular studies often support a relationship between Meliponini and Bombini, proposing independent origins of higher eusociality in both Apini and Meliponini.
A morphological, behavioral, and molecular data analysis provided strong support for the latter hypothesis of dual origins of higher eusociality. Subsequent research has reinforced the idea that stingless bees and honey bees evolved their eusocial lifestyles independently, resulting in distinct adaptive strategies for colony reproduction, brood rearing, foraging communication, and colony defense. This divergence helps explain the varied ecological and social solutions developed by these two groups of bees, such as foraging communication, colony defense/reproduction and brood rearing.
Despite this relatively good fossil record, the evolutionary history of stingless bees remains poorly understood, particularly regarding their widespread distribution across various ecological niches around the globe. The oldest known fossil stingless bee is Cretotrigona prisca, a small worker bee approximately 5 mm in body length, discovered in New Jersey amber. This species is believed to have existed during the Late Cretaceous period, around 65–70 million years ago, marking it as the oldest confirmed fossil of an apid bee and the earliest fossil evidence of a eusocial bee. C. prisca exhibits striking similarities to extant stingless bees, indicating that the evolutionary lineage of meliponines may date back to this period.
Some researchers suggest that stingless bees likely evolved in the Late Cretaceous, approximately 70–87 million years ago. According to recent studies, corbiculate bees, which include stingless bees, are thought to have appeared around 84–87 million years ago, further supporting the notion of their evolution during this dynamic period in Earth's history.
Stingless bees are valuable pollinators and contribute to ecosystem health by producing essential products. These insects collect and store honey, pollen, resin, propolis, and cerumen. Honey serves as their primary carbohydrate source, while pollen provides essential . Resin, propolis, and cerumen are used in nest construction and maintenance.
Nesting behavior varies among species and may involve hollow tree trunks, external hives, the soil, termite nest or even urban structures. This adaptability underscores their resilience and ability to coexist with human activities.
Stingless bee colonies typically follow a monogynous structure, featuring a single egg-laying queen. An exception is noted in Melipona bicolor colonies, which are often polygynous (large populations may have as many as 5 physogastric queens simultaneously involved in oviposition). Depending on the species, queens can lay varying quantities of eggs daily, ranging from a dozen (e.g., Plebeia julianii) to several hundred (e.g., Trigona recursa). While information on queen lifespans is limited, available data suggest that queens generally outlive workers, with lifespans usually falling between 1 and 3 years, although some queens may live up to 7 years.
The laying queen assumes the crucial role of producing eggs that give rise to all castes within the colony. Additionally, she plays a pivotal role in organizing the colony, overseeing a complex communication system primarily reliant on the use of .
Males in a stingless bee colony, either produced mainly by the laying queen or primarily by the workers, play an important role in reproduction. Workers can produce males by laying unfertilized eggs, enabled by the haplodiploidy system, where males are Ploidy, having only one set of , while workers are diploid and incapable of producing female eggs due to their inability to mate. This sex determination system is common to all .
At any one time, hives can contain from 300 to more than 100,000 workers (with some authors claiming to calculate more than 150,000 workers, but with no methodology explanation), depending on species.
On the other hand, clay, sourced from the wild and exhibiting diverse colors based on its mineral origin, serves as another essential raw material for SB. While it can be used in its pure form, it is more common to combine clay with vegetable to produce geopropolis. The inclusion of clay in this mixture enhances the durability and structural integrity of the resulting substance.
Vegetable resin, gathered from a variety of plant species in the wild, is an essential raw material brought back to the hive. Stored in small, sticky clumps in peripheral areas of the colony, it is often mistakenly treated as a synonym for propolis. However, in beekeeping terminology, propolis refers to a mixture of resin, wax, enzymes, and possibly other substances. Stingless bees go beyond the classic propolis by producing various derivatives from resins and wax, sometimes using pure resins for sealing or defense, a behavior not observed in Apis bees. Understanding these distinctions is important for effective production and value addition to the meliponiculture activity.
Honey, a prized product of bee colonies, is crafted through the processing of , honeydews, and fruit juices by worker bees. They store these collected substances in an extension of their gut called a crop. Back at the hive, the bees ripen or dehydrate the nectar droplets by spinning them inside their mouthparts until honey is formed. Ripening concentrates the nectar and increases the sugar content, though it is not nearly as concentrated as the honey from Apis mellifera. Stored in food pots, meliponines' honey is often referred to as pot-honey due to its distinctive storage method. Stingless bee honeys differ from A. mellifera honey in terms of color, texture, and flavor, being more liquid with a higher water content. Rich in , , and flavonoid compounds, the composition of honey varies among colonies of the same species, influenced by factors such as season, habitat, and collected resources.
Special methods are being developed to harvest moderate amounts of honey from stingless bees in these areas without causing harm. For honey production, the bees need to be kept in a box specially designed to make the honey stores accessible without damaging the rest of the nest structure. Some recent box designs for honey production provide a separate compartment for the honey stores so the honey pots can be removed without spilling honey into other areas of the nest. Unlike a hive of commercial honeybees, which can produce of honey a year, a hive of Australian stingless bees produces less than . Stingless bee honey has a distinctive "bush" taste—a mix of sweet and sour with a hint of fruit. The taste comes from plant resins—which the bees use to build their hives and honey pots—and varies at different times of year depending on the flowers and trees visited.
In 2020 researchers at the University of Queensland found that some species of stingless bee in Australia, Malaysia, and Brazil produce honey that has trehalulose—a sugar with an unusually low Glycemic index (GI) compared to that of glucose and fructose, the main sugars composing conventional honey. Such low glycaemic index honey is beneficial for humans because its consumption does not cause blood sugar to spike, forcing the body to make more insulin in response. Honey with trehalulose is also beneficial as it this sugar cannot nourish the lactic acid-producing bacteria that cause tooth decay. The university's findings supported the long-standing claims of Indigenous Australian people that native honey is beneficial to human health. This type of honey is scientifically supported as providing therapeutic value to humans as well.
Many keep the bees in their original log beehive or transfer them to a wooden box, as this makes controlling the hive easier. Some beekeepers put them in bamboos, flowerpots, coconut shells, and other recycling containers such as a water jug, a broken guitar, and other safe and closed containers.
The majority of stingless bee species exhibit a non-specific preference when it comes to selecting tree species for nesting. Instead, they opportunistically exploit whatever nesting sites are available This adaptability underscores the versatility of SB in adapting to various arboreal environments. Furthermore, cavity-nesting species can opportunistically utilize human constructions, nesting under roofs, in hollow spaces in walls, electricity boxes, or even metal tubes. In few cases, specific tree species, like Caryocar brasiliense, may be preferred by certain stingless bee species ( Melipona quadrifasciata), illustrating a degree of selectivity in nesting choices among different groups.
The entrances serve as essential visual landmarks for returning bees, and they are often the first structures constructed at a new nest site. The diversity in entrance size influences foraging traffic, with larger entrances facilitating smoother traffic but potentially necessitating more entrance guards to ensure adequate defense.
Some Partamona species exhibit a distinctive entrance architecture, where workers of P. helleri construct a large outer mud entrance leading to a smaller adjacent entrance. This unique design enables foragers to enter with high speed, bouncing off the ceiling of the outer entrance towards the smaller inner entrance. The peculiar appearance of this entrance has led to local names such as "toad mouth", highlighting the intriguing adaptations found in stingless bee nest entrances.
The quantity of brood cells within a nest displays significant variation across different stingless bee species. Nest size can range from a few brood cells, as observed in the Asian Lisotrigona carpenteri, to big expansive colonies with over 80,000 brood cells, particularly in some American Trigona species.
Meliponine colonies exhibit diverse brood cell arrangements, primarily categorized into three main types: horizontal combs, vertical combs, and clustered cells. Despite these primary types, variations and intermediate forms are prevalent, contributing to the flexibility of nest structures.
The first type involves horizontal combs, often characterized by a spiral pattern or layers of cells. The presence of spirals may not be consistent within a species, varying among colonies or even within the same colony. Some species, such as Melipona, Plebeia, Plebeina, Nannotrigona, Trigona, and Tetragona, may occasionally build spirals alongside other comb structures, as observed in Oxytrigona mellicolor. As space diminishes for upward construction, workers initiate the creation of a new comb at the bottom of the brood chamber. This innovative approach optimizes the available space when emerging bees vacate older, lower brood combs.'']]
The second prevalent brood cell arrangement involves clusters of cells held together with thin cerumen connections. This clustered style is observed in various distantly related genera, such as the American Trigonisca, Frieseomelitta, Leurotrigona, the Australian Austroplebeia, and the African Hypotrigona. This arrangement is particularly useful for colonies in irregular cavities unsuitable for traditional comb building.
The construction of vertical combs is a distinctive trait found in only two stingless bee species: the African Dactylurina and the American Scaura longula. This vertical arrangement sets these species apart from the more commonly observed horizontal comb structures in other stingless bee genera.
Upon finishing a brood cell, several workers engage in mass provisioning, regurgitating larval food into the cell. This collective effort is swiftly followed by the queen laying her egg on top of the provided larval food. The immediate sealing of the cell ensues shortly afterward, culminating this important phase of the brood rearing process.
The practice of mass provisioning, oviposition, and cell sealing is considered an ancestral trait, shared with solitary wasps and bees. However, in the context of stingless bees, these actions represent distinct stages of a highly integrated social process. Notably, the queen plays a central role in orchestrating these activities, acting as a pacemaker for the entire colony.
This process diverges significantly from brood rearing in Apis spp. In honeybee colonies, queens lay eggs into reusable empty cells, which are then progressively provisioned over several days before final sealing. The contrasting approaches in brood rearing highlight the unique social dynamics and adaptations within stingless bee colonies.
In HB ( Apis mellifera), the mother queen, accompanied by a swarm of numerous workers, embarks on relocation to a new home once replacement queens have been reared. Conversely, in SB (meliponines), the departure is orchestrated by the unmated ("virgin") queen, leaving the mother queen in the original nest. Mated stingless bee cannot leave the hive due to damaged wings and increased abdominal size post-mating (physogastrism). The queen's weight in species like Scaptotrigona postica increases, for example, about 250%.
Unlike honey bees, stingless bee colonies are unable to perform absconding - a term denoting the abandonment of the nest and migration to a new location - making them reliant on alternative strategies to cope with challenges. Meliponines progressive found new colonies without abandonning their nest abruptly.
These are the stages of stingless bees swarming:
usually do not attack bees or their food pots. However, they can cause damage to the structure of hive boxes as there are many Xylophagy species. While termites do not usually pose major problems for beekeepers, they should still be monitored closely.]] are attracted to bee colonies by the smell of food. To prevent ant attacks, it's important to handle the hive boxes carefully and avoid exposing jars of pollen and honey. Although rare, when attacks do occur, there are intense conflicts between ants and bees. Stingless bees usually manage to defend themselves, but the damage to the bee population can be significant. To prevent ant infestations in meliponaries with individual supports, a useful strategy is to impregnate the box supports with burnt oil.
Another group of enemy flies are the black soldier flies ( Hermetia illucens). They lay their eggs in crevices of boxes and can extend the tip of their abdomen during laying, facilitating access to the inside of the hive. Larvae of this species feed on pollen, feces, and other materials found in colonies. In general, healthy bee colonies can coexist peacefully with soldier flies. However, in areas where these insects are prevalent, beekeepers must remain vigilant and protect the gaps in the colonies to prevent potential issues. Cleptobiosis, also known as Kleptoparasitism, is a behaviour observed in various species of stingless bees, with over 30 identified species engaging in nest attacks, including honey bee nests. This behaviour serves the purpose of either resource theft or usurping the nest by swarming into an already occupied cavity and these bees are called robber bees. The Neotropical genus Lestrimelitta and the African genus Cleptotrigona represent bees with an obligate cleptobiotic lifestyle since they do not visit flowers for nectar or pollen.
Furthermore, other species such as Melipona fuliginosa, Oxytrigona tataira, Trigona hyalinata, Trigona spinipes, and Tetragona clavipes are reported to have comparable habits of pillaging and invading, which emphasises the variety of strategies employed by stingless bees in acquiring resources.
Other enemies include: jumping spiders (Salticidae), moths, assassin bugs (Reduviidae), beetles, parasitoid wasps, predatory mites ( Amblyseius), mantises (Mantodea), robber flies (Asilidae), etc.
, including , , , and various monkey species, are known to threaten stingless bee colonies. , , , , , , , , , , grisons, and are among the mammals that consume or destroy stingless bee nests. Some, like the tayra and eyra cat, have specific preferences for stealing honey. , , and also pose threats by hunting adult bees or consuming workers at nest entrances. and various bird species, including , , , , , , flycatchers, swifts, and , occasionally prey on stingless bees. African have developed a mutualism with human honey-hunters, actively guiding them to bee nests for honey extraction and then consuming leftover wax and larvae.
Stingless bees use other sophisticated defence tactics to protect their colonies and ensure their survival. One important strategy is to choose nesting habitats with fewer natural enemies to reduce the risk of attacks. In addition, they use camouflage and mimicry to blend into their surroundings or imitate other animals to avoid detection. An effective strategy is to nest near colonies that provide protection, using collective strength to defend against potential invaders.
Nest entrance guards play a key role in colony defense by actively preventing unauthorized entry through attacking intruders and releasing alarm to recruit additional defenders. It is worth noting that nest guards often carry sticky substances, such as resins and wax, in their corbiculae or mandibles. Stingless bees apply substances to attackers to immobilise them, thus thwarting potential threats to the colony. Some species ( Tetragonisca angustula and Nannotrigona testaceicornis, for example) also close their nest entrances with a soft and porous layer of cerumen at night, further enhancing colony security during vulnerable periods. These intricate defence mechanisms demonstrate the adaptability and resilience of stingless bees in safeguarding their nests and resources.
Unlike true honey bees, whose female bees may become workers or queens strictly depending on what kind of food they receive as larvae (queens are fed royal jelly and workers are fed pollen), the caste system in meliponines is variable, and commonly based simply on the amount of pollen consumed; larger amounts of pollen yield queens in the genus Melipona. Also, a genetic component occurs, however, and as much as 25% (typically 5–14%) of the female brood may be queens. Queen cells in the former case can be distinguished from others by their larger size, as they are stocked with more pollen, but in the latter case, the cells are identical to worker cells, and scattered among the worker brood. When the new queens emerge, they typically leave to mate, and most die. New nests are not established by swarms, but by a procession of workers that gradually construct a new nest at a secondary location. The nest is then joined by a newly mated queen, at which point many workers take up permanent residence and help the new queen raise her own workers. If a ruling queen is herself weak or dying, then a new queen can replace her. For Schwarziana quadripunctata, although fewer than 1% of female worker cells produce dwarf queens, they comprise six of seven queen bees, and one of five proceed to head colonies of their own. They are reproductively active, but less fecund than large queens.
The impact of bee pollination on agriculture is substantial. In the late 1980s, certain plants were estimated to contribute between $4.6 to $18.9 billion to the U.S. economy, primarily through insect-pollinated crops. Although some bee-pollinated plants can self-pollinate in the absence of bees, the resulting crops often suffer from inbreeding depression. The quality and quantity of seeds or fruits are significantly enhanced when bees participate in the pollination process. Although estimates of crop pollination attributed to honey bees are uncertain, it is undeniable that bee pollination is a vital and economically valuable activity.
Ramalho (2004) demonstrates that stingless bees amount to approximately 70% of all bees foraging on flowers in the Brazilian Tropical Atlantic Forest even though they represented only 7% of all bee species. In a habitat in Costa Rica, stingless bees accounted for 50% of the observed foraging bees, despite representing only 16% of the recorded bee species. Following this pattern, Cairns et al. (2005) found that 52% of all bees visiting flowers in Mexican habitats were meliponines.
Meliponine bees play a crucial role in tropical environments due to their high population rate, morphological diversity, diverse foraging strategies, generalist foraging habits (Polylectic), and flower constancy during foraging trips. Nest densities and colony sizes can result in over a million individual stingless bees inhabiting a square kilometre of tropical habitat. Due to their diverse morphology and behaviour, bees are capable of collecting pollen and nectar from a wide range of flowering plants. Key plant families are reported as most visited by meliponines: Fabaceae, Euphorbiaceae, Asteraceae and Myrtaceae.
Grüter compiled some studies about twenty crops that substantially benefit from SB pollination (following table) and also lists seventy-four crops that are at least occasionally or potentially pollinated by stingless bees.
| + !Common name !Scientific name !Family !Pollinator genus !Reference | ||||
| Annatto, achiote | Bixa orellana | Bixaceae | Melipona | |
| Aubergine | Solanum melogena | Solanaceae | Melipona | |
| Avocado | Persea americana | Lauraceae | Nannotrigona, Trigona | |
| Camu-camu | Myrciaria dubia | Myrtaceae | Melipona, Scaptotrigona | |
| Carambola | Averrhoa carambola | Oxalidaceae | Trigona | |
| Chayote, choko | Sechium edule | Cucurbitaceae | Trigona, Partamona | |
| Coconut | Cocos nucifera | Arecaceae | various genera | |
| Coffee | Coffea arabica | Rubiaceae | Lepidotrigona, Trigona | |
| Coffee | Coffea canephora | Rubiaceae | Lepidotrigona, Trigona | |
| Cucumber | Cucumis sativus | Curcubitaceae | Nannotrigona, Scaptotrigona | |
| Cupuaçu | Theobroma grandiflorum | Malvaceae | Trigona | |
| Macadamia | Macadamia integrifolia | Proteaceae | Trigona | |
| Mango | Mangifera indica | Anacardiaceae | Trigona | |
| Mapati, uvilla | Pourouma cecropiifolia | Moraceae | Oxytrigona, Trigona | |
| Mealy sage | Salvia farinacea | Lamiaceae | Nannotrigona, Tetragonisca | |
| Rambutan | Nephelium lappaceum | Sapindaceae | Scaptotrigona | |
| Rockmelon | Cucumis melo | Curcubitaceae | Heterotrigona | |
| Strawberry | Fragaria sp. | Rosaceae | various genera | |
| Sweet pepper | Capsicum annuum | Solanaceae | Austroplebeia, Melipona, Tetragonula | |
| Tomato | Solanum lycopersicum | Solanaceae | Melipona, Nannotrigona |
Africa is home to seven biodiversity hotspots, yet the recorded bee fauna is moderate relative to the continent's size. Madagascar stands out with exceptionally high levels of endemic species, though much of the bee diversity remains undocumented. Africa is home to approximately 36 species of meliponines, including seven endemic to Madagascar. Most of these bees are found in equatorian regions (tropical forests and some savannahs).
Factors such as habitat destruction, pesticide use, and invasive species pose significant threats to these pollinators. Furthermore, high rates of nest mortality, driven by predation and human activity, exacerbate conservation challenges. Research indicates that stingless bees in Africa face greater pressures than their counterparts in the American and Asian tropics, underlining the urgency for targeted conservation measures.
Uganda's Bwindi Impenetrable National Park has shown the presence of at least five stingless bee species in, distributed across two genera: Meliponula and Hypotrigona. In Madagascar, there is only one genus of stingless bees: Liotrigona.
Meliponiculture, for example, is practised in Angola and Tanzania, and interest in managing stingless bees is growing in other African countries as well.
As stingless bees are usually harmless to humans, they have become an increasingly attractive addition to the suburban backyard. Most meliponine beekeepers do not keep the bees for honey, but rather for the pleasure of conserving native species whose original habitat is declining due to human development. In return, the bees pollinate crops, garden flowers, and bushland during their search for nectar and pollen. While a number of beekeepers fill a small niche market for bush honey, native meliponines only produce small amounts and the structure of their hives makes the honey difficult to extract. Only in warm areas of Australia such as Queensland and northern New South Wales are favorable for these bees to produce more honey than they need for their own survival. Most bees only come out of the hive when it is above about . Harvesting honey from a nest in a cooler area could weaken or even kill the nest.
Also, much practical and academic work is being done about the best ways of keeping such bees, multiplying their colonies, and exploring the honey they produce. Among many others, species such as jandaíra ( Melipona subnitida) and true uruçu ( Melipona scutellaris) in the northeast of the country, mandaçaia ( Melipona quadrifasciata) and yellow uruçu ( Melipona rufiventris) in the south-southeast, tiúba or jupará ( Melipona interrupta) and canudo ( Scaptotrigona polysticta) in the north and jataí ( Tetragonisca angustula) throughout the country are increasingly kept by small, medium, and large producers. Many other species as the mandaguari ( Scaptotrigona postica), the guaraipo ( Melipona bicolor), marmelada ( Frieseomelitta varia) and the iraí ( Nannotrigona testaceicornis), to mention a few, are also reared.
According to ICMBio and the Ministry of the Environment there are presently four species of Meliponini listed in the National Red List of Threatened Species in Brazil. Melipona capixaba, Melipona rufiventris, Melipona scutellaris, and Partamona littoralis all listed as Endangered (EN).ICMBio. 2018. Livro Vermelho da Fauna Brasileira Ameaçada de Extinção: Volume VII - Invertebrados. In: ICMBio. (Org.). Livro Vermelho da Fauna Brasileira Ameaçada de Extinção. Brasília: ICMBio. 727p.
The honey from stingless bees has a higher water content, from 25% to 35%, compared to the honey from the genus Apis. This contributes to its less cloying taste but also causes it to spoil more easily. Thus, for marketing, this honey needs to be processed through desiccation, fermentation or pasteurization. In its natural state, it should be kept under refrigeration.
Mandaçaias ( Melipona quadrifasciata) are extremely tame, rarely attacking humans not even when their hives are opened for honey extraction or colony division. They form small, manageable colonies of only 400–600 individuals. They are fairly large bees, up to in length, and as a result have better body heat control, allowing them to live in regions where temperatures can drop a little lower than . However, they are somewhat selective about which flowers they will visit, preferring the flora that occurs in their natural environment. They are thus difficult to keep outside their region of origin (the eastern coast of Brazil). Once very common, the mandaçaia is now rather rare in nature, mainly due to the destruction of their native forests in Brazil.
Other groups of Brazilian stingless bees, genera Plebeia and Leurotrigona, are also very tame and much smaller, with one of them ( Plebeia minima) reaching no more than in length, and the lambe-olhos ("lick-eyes" bee, Leurotrigona muelleri) being even smaller, at no more than . Many of these species are known as mirim (meaning 'small' in the Tupi-Guarani languages). As a result, they can be kept in very small artificial hives, thus being of interest for keepers who want them as pollinators in small glasshouses or just for the pleasure of having a 'toy' bee colony at home. Being so tiny, these species produce only a very small amount of honey, typically less than 500 ml (1/2 US pint) a year, so are not viable for commercial honey production.
Belonging to the same group, the jataí ( Tetragonisca angustula), the marmelada ( Frieseomelitta varia), and the moça-branca ( Frieseomelitta doederleini) are intermediate in size between those very small species and the European bee. They are very adaptable species; the jataí, and can be reared in many different regions and environments, being quite common in most Brazilian cities. The jataí can bite when disturbed, but its jaws are weak, and in practice they are harmless, while the marmelada and moça-branca usually deposit propolis on their aggressors. Jataí is one of the first species to be kept by home beekeepers. Their nests can be easily identified in trees or wall cavities by the yellow wax tube they build at the entrance, usually guarded by some soldier bees. The marmelada and moça-branca make a little less honey, but it is denser and sweeter than most from other stingless bees and is considered very tasty.
The bees were, and still are, treated as pets. Families would have one or many log-hives hanging in and around their houses. Although they are stingless, the bees do bite and can leave welts similar to a mosquito bite. The traditional way to gather bees, still favored among the locals, is find a wild hive, then the branch is cut around the hive to create a portable log, enclosing the colony. With proper maintenance, hives have been recorded as lasting over 80 years, being passed down through generations. In the archaeological record of Mesoamerica, stone discs have been found that are generally considered to be the caps of long-disintegrated logs that once housed the beehives.
Lost-wax casting, a common metalworking method typically found where the inhabitants keep bees, was also used by the Maya. The wax from Melipona is soft and easy to work, especially in the humid Maya lowland. This allowed the Maya to create smaller works of art, jewelry, and other metalsmithing that would be difficult to forge. It also makes use of the leftovers from honey extraction. If the hive was damaged beyond repair, the whole of the comb could be used, thus using all of the hive. With experienced keepers, though, only the honey pot could be removed, the honey extracted, and the wax used for casting or other purposes.
An additional blow to the art of meliponine beekeeping is that many of the meliponicultores are now elderly, and their hives may not be cared for once they die. The hives are considered similar to an old family collection, to be parted out once the collector dies or to be buried in whole or part along with the beekeeper upon death. In fact, a survey of a once-popular area of the Maya lowlands shows the rapid decline of beekeepers, down to around 70 in 2004 from thousands in the late 1980s. Conservation efforts are underway in several parts of Mesoamerica.A comprehensive conservation guide can be found in the June 2005 issue of Bee World.
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