Black dwarf honey bee

How to recognise it

Very small at 7-9 mm and considerably darker than the red dwarf honey bee — the front of the abdomen is black rather than rust-red, which is the most useful field distinction between the two.

• Very small, with a black rather than rust-red front abdominal segment.
• Single small comb wrapped around a twig, usually low in dense forest undergrowth.
• Restricted to tropical forest in southeast Asia.
• Far more forest-dependent than Apis florea, which tolerates open and agricultural land.

Body length 7–9 mm (typically 8 mm).

Biology

Social organisation

Eusocial, colony survives the winter

Overlapping generations, division of labour, and a colony that persists through winter as a cluster. Honey bees, and the reason they store honey at all.

Colony size at peak

2,000–8,000 individuals

Colony lifespan

Continuous, with ready absconding and relocation.

Winter

No winter. Colonies migrate locally in response to forage and disturbance.

Castes

Queen, Workers, Drones

Nesting

Wax comb in a cavity

Builds a single small comb around a horizontal twig, usually concealed in dense undergrowth below two metres. As with Apis florea, sticky bands of plant resin are applied to the supporting twig on either side of the nest to stop ants reaching the comb.

Carries pollen

Corbicula (pollen basket) on the hind leg

On the wing

January to December

Active year-round in its tropical range.

Lifecycle

1. 1Nest foundingA swarm selects a concealed twig in dense vegetation and builds a single comb around it.
2. 2Colony lifeA small colony stores modest quantities of honey in the crown of the comb above the brood.
3. 3AbscondingAbandons the nest readily under disturbance or forage failure and rebuilds elsewhere.

Where it lives and what it does

Habitat

Dense tropical forest and forest edge, with a much narrower habitat tolerance than its close relative.

Distribution

Southeast Asia — southern China, Myanmar, Thailand, Laos, Vietnam, Malaysia, Indonesia and the Philippines.

Behaviour

Concealment rather than defence, and a marked dependence on forest structure. Its dance is performed on the horizontal crown of the comb with a view of the sky, as in Apis florea — pointing directly at the target rather than translating direction into an angle from gravity, which is almost certainly the ancestral form of the dance language.

Pollination role

A pollinator of tropical forest flora, and effective on small flowers that larger bees find uneconomic. Its ecological role is poorly documented.

Moderate, and genuinely under-studied — the honest position given how little work exists.

What it forages on

Tropical forest flora, with a preference for small flowers suited to its size.

Honey

Stores small quantities, occasionally harvested

Stores small quantities in the crown of the comb, harvested opportunistically where it occurs. The nest is usually destroyed in the process, which matters more for a forest-restricted species than for its adaptable relative.

Relationship with people

How people interact with it

Barely studied and rarely harvested deliberately. Its late recognition as a species is a reminder of how much remains unsettled in bee taxonomy even among honey bees, of which there are only around a dozen species in total.

Conservation

Declining with southeast Asian forest loss, and poorly monitored. Unlike Apis florea it does not adapt to agricultural and open landscapes, so forest conversion removes it outright.