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. 2021 Jan 15;7(1):e05875.
doi: 10.1016/j.heliyon.2020.e05875. eCollection 2021 Jan.

Physico-chemical characteristics of honey produced by stingless bees (Meliponula beccarii) from West Showa zone of Oromia Region, Ethiopia

Alemayehu Gela  1   2 , Zewdu Ararso Hora  1 , Deresa Kebebe  1 , Araya Gebresilassie  2
Affiliations

Physico-chemical characteristics of honey produced by stingless bees (Meliponula beccarii) from West Showa zone of Oromia Region, Ethiopia

Alemayehu Gela et al. Heliyon. .

Abstract

The study was investigated to characterize the physico-chemical properties of honey produced from stingless bees (Meliponula beccarii) in Oromia Region of Ethiopia. Honey samples were collected from underground soils through an excavation of natural nests from four representative districts (Wolmera, Jeldu, Toke Kutaye and Chalyia). About 120 honey samples (0.35-1.5 lit volumes) were collected and pooled for each respective area (district) for analysis. Principal component analysis (PCA) of pollen data and GPS were used to categorize the botanical origin and geographical location of honey sample sources, respectively. Consecutively, the physico-chemical characters were evaluated for the moisture content (MC), electrical conductivity (EC), pH, ash, total acidity (TA), hydroxyl methyl furfuraldhyde (HMF), insoluble materials (IM), and proline. The study results showed that the mean values of parameters for honey samples were: MC (29 ± 1.45), EC (0.22 ± 0.03), pH (3.73 ± 0.13), Ash (0.41 ± 1.1), TA (7.3 ± 0.36), HMF (18 ± 3.45), IM (0.70 ± 0.3) and proline (214.5 ± 15). There was no mean significance differences (P > 0.05) observed among the sampled districts for the analyzed parameters, except for proline. The values were compared against the standard physico-chemical parameters of Apis mellifera honey of Ethiopia and these values significantly varied for moisture content, total acidity and HMF. This is the first study investigated on composition property of stingless bee honey in Ethiopia and recall for further study on its nutritional and medicinal values so as to create a specific standardization.

Keywords: Honey; Parameters; Physicochemical; Standard; Stingless bee.

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Conflict of interest statement

The authors declare no conflict of interest.

Figures

Figure 1
Figure 1
Stingless bee honey harvesting and sample collection process. A shows undisturbed nest entrance with guard bees, B and C show nest excavation process, D shows sealed honey pots, E shows honey harvesting and F shows strained stingless bee honey samples.
Figure 2
Figure 2
Pollen morphology of dominant stingless bee honey plants (under Zeiss AxioVert A.1 light microscope, MP 40 X).
Figure 3
Figure 3
Clusters of the study sites based on the species diversity from honey pollen analysis of stingless bee honey (M. beccarii) using PCA plot analysis. Component 1 and 2 are PCA axis, a number in the clusters represent the sampling site, letters represent number of clusters.
See this image and copyright information in PMC

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