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A new species of endemic honeybee has been discovered in the Western Ghats

Highlights

• The new species has been named Apis karinjodian and given the common name Indian black honeybee
• It is after a gap of more than 200 years that a new species of honeybee has been spotted in the Western Ghats.
• The last honeybee described from India was Apis indica in 1798 by Fabricius
• The research team restored the status of Apis indica based on a new measure for species discrimination in honeybees termed ‘Radio-Medial Index (RMI).
• Apis karinjodian has evolved from Apis cerana morphotypes that got acclimatised to the hot and humid environment of the Western Ghats.
• Molecular analysis of mitochondrial DNA was also carried out and molecular sequence data available in the public open database NCBI-GenBank also helped confirm the species status
• The distribution of Apis karinjodian ranges from the central Western Ghats and Nilgiris to the southern Western Ghats, covering the States of Goa, Karnataka, Kerala and Tamil Nadu