SCANNING ELECTRON MICROSCOPIC STUDIES ON ANTENNAL SENSILLA ORGANS OF ADULT HONEY BEE WORKS IN GENUS APIS (HYMENOPTERA: APIDAE)

Abstract

Antennae are the main sites of the olfactory receptors in most insects. The flagellum is covered with several kinds of small innervate setae and other minute sensory structures. Sensilla organs thought responsible for hygienic behavior particularly inside bee colony. They are capable of identifying dead, injured or infested brood inside capped brood cells (Gramacho and Goncalves, 2003). Stort and Rebustini (1998) found relationship between the defensive behavior and the numbers of sensilla Placodea, Campaniformea and Coeloconica in the Africanized honeys bees. Antennal sensilla organs of adult Apis florae (F.) workers are Placodea, Basiconicsa. Trichodea, Ampullacea, Coeloconica and Campaniformia (Gupta, 1992). Apis cerana are able to perceive a stimulus from a mite infested worker brood cells (Rath and Drescher, 1990). The number of the sensilla organs in the antenna of tolerant worker bee against varroa mites was higher than on tolerant works bees (Salem et al., 2001). This study describes the types, measurements and distribution of the sensilla organs on the different segments of the antennae of Apis florae (F.) and Apis mellifera (L.) works by SEM and compare the results obtained by the other studies. The major objective of this work was to examine the sensilla organs of some races of genus Apis, particularly the native bees; Apis mellifera yemeniticsa and aggressive Africanized bees.