European dark bee

Apis mellifera mellifera
Scientific classification Edit this classification
Domain: Eukaryota
Kingdom: Animalia
Phylum: Arthropoda
Class: Insecta
Order: Hymenoptera
Family: Apidae
Genus: Apis
Species:
A. mellifera
Subspecies:
A. m. mellifera
Trinomial name
Apis mellifera mellifera
Synonyms[2]
  • Apis mellifica germanica (Pollmann 1879)
  • Apis mellifica nigrita (Lucas 1882)
  • Apis mellifica mellifica variety lehzeni (Buttel-Reepen 1906)
  • Apis mellifica mellifica variety siziliana (Buttel-Reepen 1906)
  • Apis mellifera mellifera variety tesquorum (Skorikov 1929)
  • Apis niger (Baldensperger 1932)
  • Apis mellifica mellifica siloarum (Goetze 1964)

The Apis mellifera mellifera (commonly known as the European dark bee) is a subspecies of the western honey bee, evolving in central Asia, with a proposed origin of the Tien Shan Mountains[3] and later migrating into eastern and then northern Europe after the last ice age from 9,000BC onwards. Its original range included the southern Urals in Russia and stretched through northern Europe and down to the Pyrenees. They are one of the two members of the 'M' lineage of Apis mellifera, the other being in western China.[4] Traditionally they were called the Black German Bee,[5] although they are now considered endangered in Germany.[6] However today they are more likely to be called after the geographic / political region in which they live such as the British Black Bee, the Native Irish Honey Bee, the Cornish Black Bee and the Nordic Brown Bee, even though they are all the same subspecies, with the word "native" often inserted by local beekeepers, even in places where the bee is an introduced foreign species.[7] It was domesticated in Europe and hives were brought to North America in the colonial era in 1622 where they were referred to as the English Fly by the Native Americans.[8]

  1. ^ Michael S Engel (1999). "The taxonomy of recent and fossil honey bees (Hymenoptera: Apidae; Apis)". Journal of Hymenoptera Research. 8 (2): 180. Retrieved 28 January 2023.
  2. ^ Michael S Engel (1999). "The taxonomy of recent and fossil honey bees (Hymenoptera: Apidae; Apis)". Journal of Hymenoptera Research. 8 (2): 180. Retrieved 28 January 2023.
  3. ^ Chao Chen; Zhiguang Liu; Qi Pan; Xiao Chen; Huihua Wang; Haikun Guo; Shidong Liu; Hongfeng Lu; Shilin Tian; Ruiqiang Li; Wei Shi (2016). "Genomic Analyses Reveal Demographic History and Temperate Adaptation of the Newly Discovered Honey Bee Subspecies Apis mellifera sinisxinyuan n. ssp". Molecular Biology and Evolution. 5 (33): 1337–1348. doi:10.1093/molbev/msw017. PMC 4839221. PMID 26823447.
  4. ^ Tihelka, E.; Cai, C.; Pisani, D. (2020). "Mitochondrial genomes illuminate the evolutionary history of the Western honey bee (Apis mellifera)". Scientific Reports. 10 (1): 14515. Bibcode:2020NatSR..1014515T. doi:10.1038/s41598-020-71393-0. PMC 7471700. PMID 32884034.
  5. ^ Stratton-Porter, G. (1925). The Keeper of the Bees. New York: Doubleday, Page & Company. pp. 77 & 152.
  6. ^ "Rote Liste der bedrohten Nutztierrassen in Deutschland". g-e-h.de. Gesellschaft zur Erhaltung alter und gefährdeter Haustierrassen e. V. (GEH). Archived from the original on 7 April 2018. Retrieved 19 November 2018.
  7. ^ "Colonsay Dark Native Bees (Photo at bottom))". Colonsay Black Bee Reserve. snhbs.scot. SNHBS. Retrieved 19 November 2018.
  8. ^ Renaud, Tabitha (2010). Finding worth in the wilderness (Thesis ed.). Ottawa, Canada: University of Ottawa. p. 74. ISBN 978-0-494-74142-9. Retrieved 16 November 2018.