Comparison of local honey bee of Van-Çatak with mobile honey bees in terms of some morphological characteristics

Domestic honey bee genotypes are very important for future breeding studies. Therefore, effective uncontrolled migratory beekeeping on these populations should be controlled. In this study carried out with the aim of revealing the effect of uncontrolled migratory beekeeping on local genotypes, Çatak district of Van province was chosen as the study area. In this study, a total of 450 worker bees samples were obtained from two villages, five local and five migratory beekeepers in Çatak district, which is preferred by migratory beekeepers. A total of 21 morphological features were discussed in worker bees placed in jars containing 70 % ethyl alcohol after being knocked out with diethyl ether. Descriptive statistics for continuous variables; the mean is expressed as standard error, minimum and maximum. Student t test was used to compare group means in terms of these characteristics. As a result of statistical analysis, only T3 (3rd tergite width) and CI (cubital index) differences were found to be significant between genotype groups (p <0.05), but there were no differences in other characteristics. Although the populations that are among the national values of the country and which will be the source of recent breeding activities are located in the remote corners of Anatolia, it is inevitable that valuable genotypes will come out of hand if the beekeeping is not controlled. Keywords: Domestic ecotype, Honey bee (Apis mellifera L.), Migratory beekeeping, Morphological traits, Van City