Guardians of the Hive: Sustaining Stingless Bee Keeping in Manipur’s Thoyee village

“THE LIFE cycle of stingless bees may be short, but their hive lasts for generations,” says Rawon Muinao, a traditional knowledge (TK) holder from Thoyee village, who practiced stingless beekeeping (locally known as Khoiror or Mikza) for over two decades. Using specially designed wooden boxes crafted through his own experience, Rawon has developed a sustainable system for colony management. Remarkably, one of his hives has lasted over 20 years, undergoing nearly 10 colony divisions. His practices are guided by ancestral wisdom passed down through sayings and proverbs-one of which cautions, “Stingless bee honey combs, cut by iron and bars, turns bitter.”

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Rawon emphasizes the importance of using purpose-built wooden boxes instead of traditional logs, as these allow for continual and sustainable honey harvesting. Though stingless bees yield less honey than Apis species, he highlights their honey’s medicinal and cultural value. Based on his observations in Thoyee village, he recognizes three local species, classified by their nest entrance structures-those with a waxen tube, those without one, and those with an enlarged entrance tube.

Stingless bees exhibit remarkable nesting diversity, occupying tree cavities, rock crevices, or underground chambers. Their adaptability enables them to thrive across varied habitats. Reproductively, they resemble solitary bees, laying eggs atop a food mass within sealed cells. Their nests feature a central brood area encased in multilayered wax and resin (involucrum), surrounded by storage pots for pollen and honey, and connected to the outside through a waxen entrance tube. These intricate structures reveal their ecological resilience and social complexity. Being stingless, they defend themselves using bites and resin, which may serve as both a physical and chemical deterrent. Rawon notes that, over his years of experience, he has never observed predator attacks-suggesting that their resin may act as a natural defense or that they occupy a stable ecological niche within the local food web.

In Northeast India (NEI)-a region rich in subtropical forests, floral diversity, and traditional ecological knowledge-stingless bees such as Melipona (tribe Meliponini, family Apidae) and Tetragonula iridipennis play vital roles in pollination, biodiversity maintenance, and local livelihoods. Their products- honey, pollen, and resin-support subsistence, traditional healing, and cultural practices. Resin, in particular, is traditionally used for cloths weaving, preserving tools, and deterring insects. Globally, over 600 stingless bee species have been identified, distributed mainly across tropical and subtropical regions of the Neotropics, Africa, Asia, and Australia. Rawon notes that in Ukhrul there are about six distinct species differing in body size, shape, and color-yet all exhibit advanced social organization, efficient communication, and cooperative nest defense.

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However, their survival in the region faces mounting threats. Forest fragmentation from deforestation and fire has reduced nesting sites and floral diversity, directly impacting colony density and survival. As Melipona and Tetragonula iridipennis prefer tree cavities and shaded habitats, loss of mature forests severely limits their nesting opportunities. Agricultural intensification, driven by heavy pesticide and fertilizer use, further compounds the problem. Chemicals such as neonicotinoids and organophosphates cause both lethal and sublethal effects, impairing foraging, navigation, and brood development. In areas lacking awareness of pollinator-friendly practices, such chemical use endangers both wild and domesticated colonies. Equally concerning is the limited scientific management of stingless bees, which remains underexplored and underdeveloped. In this context, traditional knowledge and TK holders like Rawon play a crucial role in sustaining stingless beekeeping as a viable community livelihood.

Ecologically, stingless bees are keystone pollinators supporting both wild and cultivated flora. Their foraging behavior influences floral biology, plant reproduction, and microbial dispersal-driving forest regeneration and agricultural productivity. Studies indicate that stingless bees visit flowers from over 220 plant families and 1,400 genera, including Fabaceae, Asteraceae, Rubiaceae, Malvaceae, and Lamiaceae, reflecting their generalist nature and adaptability. Yet, human activities are disrupting this balance. Habitat loss, excessive colony extraction, and climate change exert severe pressures on wild populations. Rising temperatures, erratic rainfall, and prolonged droughts in NEI disrupt flowering cycles, reduce nectar availability, and desynchronize plant–pollinator interactions. Moreover, unmanaged meliponiculture and commercial honey collection often destroy nests, diminishing wild colonies and genetic diversity.

Indigenous communities have long practiced sustainable meliponiculture, often integrating hives within forest gardens and bamboo groves. However, weakened transmission of traditional knowledge threatens the continuity of these practices. At the same time, scientific advancements in stingless beekeeping remain limited. Sustainable management must therefore integrate traditional ecological knowledge with scientific research to ensure both ecological and cultural continuity. Conservation of stingless bees in the region requires a multi-layered approach: restoring forests and habitat corridors to maintain population connectivity, promoting pollinator-friendly and organic agriculture, developing community-based meliponiculture programs, merging indigenous knowledge with scientific training, and incorporating stingless bees into biodiversity and forest management policies. In particular, community-level planning is essential, as government interventions often overlook local livelihood realities.

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Significant knowledge and gaps persist across underexplored regions, underscoring the need for interdisciplinary research linking floral traits, bee morphology, and pollination outcomes. Scientific interventions can help make native stingless bees a sustainable source of income while reinforcing the intrinsic human-nature relationship essential for biodiversity conservation and resilient livelihoods. Sustaining diverse floral resources is key to maintaining stingless bee populations and the vital pollination services they provide. Ultimately, stingless bees are evolutionary survivors, ecological keystones, and cultural indicators of ecosystem health. Safeguarding them means preserving not only biodiversity but also the intertwined ecological, economic, and cultural heritage that defines the landscapes of Northeast India.

(The author is a member of Rainforest Biodiversity of Phalee. He can be reached at phalee.rfb@gmail.com)