Correlation of biometric and productiveparameters in colonies of Melipona scutelaris

ABSTRACT The objective of this research was to estimate the correlations between the biometric and reproductive parameters of Melipona scutelaris. Four collections were performed with 30-day intervals, consisting of the evaluation of each colony, considering the following parameters: honey pot size and volume (HPS and VHP), estimated honey production (EHP), number of combs (NC), mean diameter of the combs (MDC), height of the combs (HC), height of rearing cells (HRC), number of pups (NP) population (POP) and wax envelope in pups. The data were analyzed using the SAS software (2004), and the Pearson correlation coefficient was used for the correlation calculations. The correlations of the studied variables of production and biometrics of Melipona scutellaris colonies made it possible to perceive that the variable number of honey pots (NHP) present a higher correlation with HPS, EPH, DMC, HRC, NP and POP, followed by size of pots of honey (HPS) with: VHP, EHP, MDC, HC and POP. For future studies using the productive and biometric characteristics of the bees Melipona scutellaris can be considered for EPH, VHP, EPH, NC and POP, as variable responses.