The Effect of Storage Pollen and Protein Stimulatory Feeding on Some Hygienic Behaviors of Honey Bee Colonies Against Varroa Mite

Two separate experiments were carried out to examine the effect of increasing availability of protein sources to honey bee workers on their hygienic behaviors. The 1st experiment was conducted on 10 honey bee colonies in 2 groups using t test. First group colonies were fed with pollen substitute cake for three times but the other group were kept as control. The second investigation was conducted as completely randomized design with four different storage pollen levels (3000, 1500, 750 and 750cm2 with pollen trap) and four replications. In both experiments, grooming behavior was measured by gathering and counting the number of fallen mites on the bottom of the hives and brood removal rate by freeze–killing broods and counting the number of broods that removed by workers at different periods. Data analysis of the 1st experiment showed that feeding or not with pollen substitute cake had not significant effect on appearance rate of both measured honey bee hygienic behaviors (grooming and removing). In the second experiment also the rate of grooming behavior was not affected by levels of storage pollen. But from the view point of removing killed broods there was a significant difference between treatments in the 1st counting period (p 0.01). Mean comparison of treatments at this period showed that mean removal rate of colonies containing the highest (3000 cm2) pollen storage was 36.13% in contrast to the lowest (750 with trap) rate (27.30 %)