The following is a book review of the best source of info on the world's bees that I have seen. Of course, this is the original distribution, not the current man-made distribution. Eva Crane's work covers that better, no doubt.


Biogeography and Taxonomy of Honeybees. - Friedrich Ruttner. 1988. Springer Verlag, New York. xii + 284 pp. $87.50 (hardcover).  Reviewed by - Lynn S. Kimsey, Museum of Comparative Zoology, Harvard University

The biology and morphometrics of honeybees have received increasing attention over the past decade because of the problems encountered in the Western Hemisphere with the Africanized honeybee. For such a small genus, Apis is one of the most widespread and, in human eyes, dominant groups of insects. However, up until Ruttner's work, there has been no thorough, comparative source which summarizes information on the species and races of honeybees. 

The book is basically organized in 3 parts. First, a general overview of the genus Apis is given, which includes discussions of biology, phylogeny, and geographic variation. Second, are detailed discussions of the distribution, morphology, biology, and to some extent physiology of each species. Finally, the last chapters, comprising nearly half the book, are devoted to discussions of each geographic/morphometric race of Apis mellifera L. recognized by the author. The text is clearly written but terse. In fact some discussions become almost telegraphic. I find this a pleasant change from similar types of studies which tend to expand a small amount of information into a large amount of verbiage. However, some chapters, particularly the introductory ones, would have benefitted from more extensive discussions. Somehow one paragraph on the ecology of honeybees seems inadequate. It is easy to see where the author's interests lie, as comparatively speaking, he waxes poetic in his discussions of the races of Apis mellifera. Overall the book is well organized, beautifully illustrated and informative. 

The chapters on species and races of Apis provide information on each of these groups in a clearly organized, comparative manner. For each species there is a discussion of morphology, particularly that of the male terminalia; distribution; behavior, including comparisons of dance language, foraging activities, swarming and colony defenses; morphometrics; physiology; parasites, and relationships with man. Discussions of mellifera races are arranged by general geographic region, and include taxonomic problems, precise distributions, morphometric characteristics and behavioral peculiarities. 

I have several complaints with this work. The first is a matter of nomenclature. Throughout the text Ruttner refers to "races of honeybees" and yet the names he uses are clearly subspecies. He even proposes the name Apis mellifera macedonica ssp. nova as a new subspecies, but in the diagnosis he calls it a race. I find this confusing, as strictly speaking, races are not given official names according to the Zoological Code of Nomenclature. There is also the phrase: "two new Braula species of the genus Megabraula . . ." which is unclear and may just be a problem of translation. Second, the study of Winston and Michener (1977) is cited repeatedly as the finalword on the phylogenetic relationships of the apid subfamilies. The later study by Kimsey (1984) made some corrections of the earlier paper and provided additional characteristics. Ruttner actually does cite this 1984 paper in his references but I could find no reference to it in the text. Finally, to my knowledge, no one has been able to demonstrate resource competition between honeybees and native bees. The statement: "Therefore it seems that the bigger [Apis] species avoid disastrous competition by shifting to other more distant [food] sources" has to be my favorite. 

I do have one final criticism, which is addressed to the publisher: the price of this volume is outrageous, and will discourage many interested individuals from buying a copy. 

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