The Sicilian bee is a dark island population of the central Mediterranean, adapted to heat and drought.

Characteristics

• Colour: Dark, almost black
• Size: Smaller than most European subspecies
• Temper: Relatively calm
• Colony size: Moderate

Adaptations

• Heat and drought: It functions at high temperatures where other subspecies spend their strength on cooling
• Rapid response to dearth: Brood rearing stops and stores are conserved
• Frugal winter consumption
• Little drifting

The decline

This population declined sharply through the importation of other subspecies and the crossing that followed. It disappeared from much of its original range.

It has been the subject of conservation work in which surviving pure lines were collected and rebuilt in isolated areas.

Why conservation matters

Heat and drought tolerance are traits that gain importance as climates warm. They reside in populations like this one.

Once an adaptation has gone from a population it cannot be recreated — no breeding programme can rebuild thousands of years of selection.

The wider lesson

The story of this bee is the pattern that repeats with many local subspecies: importation of a line that looks more productive in a catalogue, crossing, loss of adaptation, and then the laborious attempt at recovery.

Protected mating areas and pure-line programmes exist to break that pattern.