the following excerpt is from Trends in Genetics, July 2016, Vol. 32, No. 7

Abundant examples of rapid phenotypic evolution are not automatically inconsistent with
the paradigm that molecular evolution in nature should generally remain slow. For instance, there
is probably ascertainment bias towards reporting examples of rapid phenotypic evolution in
the literature, compared with studies of populations in which nothing happened. 

Another issue is knowing the extent to which contemporary evolution is driven by environments changing
much faster than ‘natural’ due to human activities. Classic examples of such human-induced
adaptations include the rapid evolution of industrial melanism in the peppered moth and the
increased rates of phenotypic change in human-harvested organisms.

Even if rapid phenotypic evolution is common in nature, evolutionary dynamics on the molecular
level could remain practically indistinguishable from random genetic drift if rapidly evolving traits
tend to be highly polygenic. In that case, their selective responses could be due to subtle
frequency changes of genetic polymorphisms at a large number of loci.

¶

Examples of rapid evolution in honey bee; the first one especially seems likely due to drift while the last due to selective pressure. The second one - ?

Avalos, Arian, et al. "A soft selective sweep during rapid evolution of gentle behaviour in an Africanized honeybee." Nature Communications 8.1 (2017): 1550.

Moritz, Robin FA, and Peter Neumann. "The Cape honeybee (Apis mellifera capensis). From laying workers to social parasites." Apidologie 33.2 (2002): 99-104.

Oddie, Melissa AY, Bjørn Dahle, and Peter Neumann. "Norwegian honey bees surviving Varroa destructor mite infestations by means of natural selection." PeerJ 5 (2017): e3956.

¶

I have stated in the past that most people who go on about the "genetics" of honey bees haven't a clue what is involved. You see this endlessly over at Bee Source. Anyone who tries to talk about population genomics is pretty quickly swamped. Here, it's mostly met with polite silence.

PLB

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