Invasive Ant Detection: Evaluating Honeybee Learning and Discrimination Abilities for Detecting <i>Solenopsis invicta</i> Odor.

ABSTRACT: Invasive red imported fire ants (Solenopsis invicta) create a serious threat to public safety, agriculture, biodiversity, and the local economy, necessitating early detection and surveillance, which are currently time-consuming and dependent on the inspector's expertise. This study marks an initial investigation into the potential of honeybees (Apis mellifera) to detect and discriminate the odor of S. invicta through the olfactory conditioning of proboscis extension responses. Deceased S. invicta were used as conditioned stimuli to ensure relevance to non-infested areas. The results showed that the bees rapidly learned to respond to deceased ant odors, with response levels significantly increasing at higher odor intensities. Bees exhibited generalization across

SUBMITTER: Chinkangsadarn S 

PROVIDER: S-EPMC11508661 | biostudies-literature | 2024 Oct

REPOSITORIES: biostudies-literature