Tropilaelaps Mites of Honey Bees - Dr. Jeff Pettis

If you want to support this channel, please consider becoming part of our community. In today's episode, I speak with Dr. Jeff Pettis, former research leader of the USDA Beltsville lab and current president of Apimondia. Jeff and I have worked together for a long time, first when he was my boss at the USDA, and later on several projects related to honey bee health. We discussed our time in Thailand, where he introduced me to the subject of today's podcast episode: Tropilaelaps, a mite with the potential to be a bigger problem than Varroa mites. I hope you enjoy our conversation. We talked about his career working with social insects and also discussed his latest research publication on honey bees. The publication reveals that varroa mites, an important pest of honey bees, feed differently depending on the life stage of the parasitized honey bee. This discovery is significant as it greatly enhances our understanding of the life cycle of this important honey bee pest, which causes significant damage to the beekeeping industry. I want to thank our academy members for their support and you for watching.