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Nest Guarding Behaviour of Stingless Bees, Heterotrigona itama (H.
itama)
Badrul Amin bin Abdul Malek
Supervisor: Dr. Norasmah binti Basari
Bachelor of Applied Science
(Biodiversity Conservation and Management)
School of Marine and Environmental Science
Meliponi activities has been accepted by local farmer and related studies has
been done in this field to enhance the understanding of this bees and their
behaviours. However, stingless bee nest guarding behaviour are poorly studied
particularly on species Heterotrigona itama (H. itama). This situation may put
the stingless bee in harm if being placed in a vulnerable spot. A study was
conducted to determine the nest guarding behaviours of this species towards
different odours related towards their predators. The experiments reveal that
the stingless bees attack aggressively towards both dummy intruders that
attached with the odour of their nestmate and non-nestmate. The dummy with
distilled water and the odour of weaver ants however were being ignored most
of the time by the guards and the foragers. Future studies on the chemical
component in the formic acid of the weaver ants may help in understanding
the stingless bee’s defense behaviours.
1684 | UMT UNDERGRADUATE RESEARCH DAY 2018