Sunday, December 14, 2014

Foraging activities of stingless bee (Hymenoptera: Apidae: Hetrotrigona itama)

*Corresponding author: ghaziyah89@gmail.com
Abstract

A study on foraging activities of stingless bees (Hymenoptera: Apidae: Hetrotrigona itama) was conducted at Taman Tropika Kenyir (TTK), Terengganu from April until September 2014. The objective of this study was to investigate the active period time of foraging activities of Heterotrigona itama.  The foraging activities which include of the total number of outgoing foragers, incoming foragers with pollen load, and incoming foragers without pollen load were observed from 0800 to 1800 hour for each month.  There was significant difference in terms of average number of incoming foragers with pollen load to the hive by the time (F10,22 =5.852, P < 0.05). Overall result shows that the most effective time for the foragers to outgoing from the hive and incoming to the hive was early in the morning between 0800 to 1000 hour, and eventually declined after 1200 hours. Based on the observation most of the incoming foragers without pollen load carried nectar or propolis at about 1300-1400.  Information from this study is important in order to understand the survival determinant and dispersal adaptation of the stingless bees for future crop pollination success. 
Keywords: Heterotrigona itama, Foraging actitivities, Pollen