apis mellifera sperm alive

[chrisimbee]

Hello,

I've bee a beekeeper for more than 15 years now and I thought It would be interestiong to observe honey bee sperm from drones as they are really very motile and active..

Here is a preliminary video to give yu an idea what they look like.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=nB1Bnlq05wg

You got to know that the queen bee is equiped with a storage organ in wich she keeps them alive for her whole life (5 years max!) . We dont know yet exactly how she can do that and the biological mecanism involved.

Still, you'll see they are very thin with a particularly very lon tail. We cant really distinguish the head but they are very very dynamic.

CHRis

[chrisimbee]

02 spermatozoides abeilles acridine.jpg (89.79 KiB) Viewed 1284 times

with acridin orange under blue light @ 435nm : we can see the heads that become fluorescent in bright green.

[chrisimbee]

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=BcwYNtn ... chrisimbee

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=SR2e_yK ... chrisimbee