Meliponines - Saving Stingless Bees

Most people are familiar with the honey bee, known to produce delicious honey, but feared because of their stingers. These are actually called apis which literally means bees in Latin. However, little is known about the stingless bees, which are endemic to tropical countries like Malasyia. They come from the same family as the apis bees, which is the Apidae family. Besides their appearance and their hives, apis and stingless bees, or meliponines as they are known, are very similar in behavior. Meliponines forage on plant nectar and produce honey too. But as their name indicates, stingless bees do not sting, but will bite if not treated or handled properly.

This very informative book is available online on Amazon
in paperback version. E-book version is also available.

There are more than 500 species of meliponines through out the world mainly in tropical countries, of which more than 50 are found in Malaysia. There may be more, as many species have yet to be identified. Records, documents and research on meliponines are dated only from the turn of the 19th century, much later than the apis bees, thus there is still much uncertainty with regards to actual numbers.

Professor Mappataba - picture taken in 2010
during a course on beekeeping conducted by the
National Apiary Centre in Air Itam, Johor.

At this time of writing, the most common species cultured are the H.itama and G. thoracica species as these are the most commercially viable for honey production. As mentioned earlier, meliponiculture is still very new in Malaysia especially, having been introduced by Professor Mappataba from Indonesia only five years ago. It is hoped that with research and development, we are able to culture more species for this purpose.


In Malaysia, it can be said that Tuan Abu Hassan Jalil is the expert in meliponines and meliponiculture. A horticulturist by profession, he became passionate about meliponines and is dedicating much of his time, energy and resources towards the conservation of these bees. He is now a prime point of reference not only to researchers and beekeepers locally but also worldwide. He and his partner, Dr. Ibrahim Shuib have done intensive and extensive research and together they have written a book titled Beescape for Meliponines - Conservation of Indo-Malayan Stingless Bees published by Partridge Publishing.


As jungles and forests are being cleared for development and planting of palm oil trees, many colonies are are being forced out of their habitats and even worse, destroyed as logs hosting the bee hives are burnt. There are those who purposely cut down trees from forests to take the hives, usually selling them off at prices that are steadily escalating as the demand gets higher. If this goes on without any control, the number of stingless bee colonies will dwindle in no time.

While Bilut Valley Bee Farm is culturing bees for their honey, we are also very concerned about their preservation and support in all conservation efforts. Stingless bees play a major role in pollination and the eco system as a whole. We are, in reality, so dependant on them that without them, our food source will be wiped out.