Brood odor discrimination abilities in hygienic honey bees (Apis melliferaL.) using proboscis extension reflex conditioning

To understand rite effect of abnormal brood odors on the initiation ou cont rol of hygienic behavior bl honey bees, we employed the associative learnin g paradigm, proboscis extension reflex conditioning Bees front two genetic lines(hygienic and non-hygienic) weve able to discriminate between high con centrations of two floral odors equally well. Differential discrimination a bilities were observed between the two lines when healthy and diseased broo d odors were used, with the bees from the hygienic line discriminating betw een the pair of brood odors better than the non-hygienic bees. These result s suggest that hygienic behavior in individual bees is associated with the bees' responses to olfactory stimuli emanating from diseased brood.