Living in honey: bacterial and fungal communities in honey of sympatric populations of Apis mellifera and the stingless bee Melipona beecheii, in Yucatan, Mexico

Abstract

Bacterial and fungal communities in the honey of sympatric populations of the bee species Apis mellifera and Melipona beecheii were profiled by amplicon sequencing of the 16S gene and the ITS of the ribosomal DNA. Results showed that the structure of the honey microbiota of these two bee species was very different from each other. Both the bacterial and fungal species in A. mellifera honey were more similar to those of A. mellifera honey reported for other parts of the world than to those in M. beecheii honey. Nevertheless, in both, the most abundant bacterial species belonged to the family Lactobacillaeae.

Keywords: Amplicon sequencing; Honey microbiome; Lactobacillaceae; Microbial communities; Native bees; Tropical beekeeping.