Professor Dr. Hab. Jerzy Woyke Doctor Honoris Causa Mult. (9 September 1926–20 Dezember 2022)—in Memoriam

Prof. Dr. Hab. Jerzy Woyke (Figure 1), during over 70 years of scientific work made scientific discoveries that place him in a leading position among bee researchers around the world. He became an outstanding authority in reproductive biology, artificial insemination of queens, genetics, cytology, and parasitology of bees. He published over 820 papers, of which 502 are original scientific papers, including 252 published abroad, in scientific journals of international importance. His 25 most important scientific achievements are summarized in Table 1, and an interview with the late professor can be found in Bee World 98 (Woyke & Brodschneider, 2021).

Figure 1. (a) Prof. Woyke with Apis laboriosa workers during his last scientific expedition to Bhutan, (b) Prof. Woyke with an honorary doctorate from University of Warmia and Mazury in Olsztyn, (c) In the Philippines, while observing a colony of Apis dorsata breviligula, and (d) In Bangalore (India) while observing a colony of Apis dorsata.

Table 1. Twenty-five important scientific achievements of Woyke for the development of current knowledge about honey bees.

1955–1960	Proved that queen mates naturally not with 1 drone as it was believed till that time, but it mate several times with several drones. This completely changed the bases of bee genetics.
1960	Elaborated the most effective volume for instrumental insemination of queens (8 mm^3 of semen, now accepted standard).
1962–1982	Improved the method of instrumental insemination of queen bees by investigating optimal conditions.
1962–1978	Solved the question of sex determination in bees. Till that time it was believed that drones develop from unfertilized eggs, which have 16 chromosomes and female bees (workers and queens) develop from fertilized eggs, which have 32 chromosomes. Prof. Woyke proved that drones may develop from fertilized eggs too. Drones have the same number of chromosomes as worker bees and queen bees.
1963	Discovery of cannibalism in bees.
1963, 1969	Elaborated on rearing of diploid drones.
1972, 1973	Described natural mating of Indian bee Apis cerana.
1973	Setting border of Africanized bees in North America. They will not spread in places where the winter is longer than 3 months.
1973, 1990, 1992	Elaborated method to manage aggressive Africanized bees.
1973, 1975	Elaborated method of instrumental insemination of Indian bees A. cerana.
1973	Found eye color mutation, orange (laranja).
1974–1984	Discovered diploidal and multiple spermatozoa.
1976	Elaborated domain of genetics of sex alles in bees.
1977	Explained the reasons for up to 50% of bee brood disappearing.
1979	Elaborating sex determination in Indian bees A. cerana
1977, 2000	Elaborating the domain of eye color in bees and different expressions in worker bees, queens, and drones.
1984–2000	Investigated the biology and elaborated the method to control the mite Tropilaelaps clareae without medicaments. This enabled to save Apis bees in South East Asia.
1985	Determining the border for the spread of the mite T. clareae. That mite will parasite places where the winter is longer than 2–3 weeks.
1996–2004	Together with the Russian Institute of Physiology in St. Petersburg investigations on eye mutation which helped to cure eye disease in people.
1998	Discovering that bee eggs change its size during the period of incubation.
1999	Investigated the behavior of 2 different species of bees; A. mellifera and A. dorsata and elaborated method to keep the 2 different species in one hive.
2005	Determined 2-day cycles of periodic mass-flights in the Giant bee A. dorsata.
2004	Discovered different hygienic behaviors of 2 Megapis species; A. dorsata and A. laboriosa, Tropilaelaps parasitizing sealed bee brood. A. dorsata does not open sealed parasitized cells. This prevents spreading the mite in the colony.
2011	Proved that mating sign origins from 2 drones and not from 1, as it was believed.
2012	Described, which Himalayan cliffs, A. laboriosa selects for nesting sites and why.

The Professor’s scientific research was mostly conducted in an extremely simple, but deeply thought-out way and based on extensive knowledge. He was able to solve unfathomable scientific problems by means of very simple and, in fact, obvious reasoning and to draw unexpected but obvious conclusions. This way of working was appreciated by younger academics, as evidenced by the concentration of students forming the “Woyke School” in the circle of his influence. It can be safely stated that all active researchers in the field of beekeeping in Poland were at some stage of scientific development directed, promoted, or evaluated by the Professor.

In his scientific activity, he visited 76 countries of the world, several of them many times. For 27 years, he implemented domestic and foreign grants, including the USDA—five times. He was awarded eight foreign scholarships (Rockefeller, DAAD (https://www.daad.de/en/), Brazil, Norway, Australia, and USDA). Fifteen foreign trips were financed (USA, England, France, German Federal Republic, Russia, India, Thailand, Japan, South Africa, Australia, Tunisia, Nepal), to several countries twice. He also completed seven internships abroad.

The professor organized trips abroad for Polish scientists and junior scientists from foreign countries. He also managed the scientific internships of foreign guests coming to Poland. He prepared 544 reviews, including 23 doctoral theses, 20 habilitation theses, 20 applications for the title of professor, 155 research projects, 193 scientific papers, 39 expert opinions, 94 opinions, and reviews for foreign centers. He was also a recognized FAO (UN) expert in 11 countries: Guinea, El Salvador, Costa Rica, Afghanistan, Vietnam, Ghana, Egypt, Sudan, Albania, Algeria, and Mexico. He conducted numerous courses in nine countries and gave lectures in six languages (English, German, Spanish, Portuguese, French, and Russian). He conducted research in 24 countries, which resulted in 133 scientific publications. He has conducted longer courses abroad and lectures at universities in 11 countries. It is no exaggeration to say that J. Woyke was an ambassador of Polish science in the world.

In recognition of his outstanding contribution to bee science, IBRA Council has conferred Honorary Membership upon Prof. Woyke. The chairman of the IBRA board Hans Kjærsgaard wrote: “Please accept this award as recognition of your distinguished career and great contributions to the Journal of Apicultural Research. You are not only the author, who published a paper in the first edition in 1962 and last issue of 2011, but only one, the longest and still writing for our magazine.” In response, Professor. Woyke wrote: “This is the greatest honor for me because IBRA is the most important organization of the bee researchers of the world.” On this occasion, the chief Editor of JAR, Normann Carreck wrote a special article devoted to the jubilee of both JAR and the Professor (Carreck, 2011; Wilde, 2012).

Throughout the activities of Jerzy Woyke, his commitment to cooperation with the Faculty of Animal Bioengineering of the University of Warmia and Mazury in Olsztyn cannot be overlooked. Thanks to this activity, in 2002, Woyke was honored with the highest academic honorary title—doctor honoris causa—awarded by universities to people who have made special contributions to science. Four years earlier, this dignity was given to him at the West Pomeranian University of Technology in Szczecin.

The scientific activity of Jerzy Woyke has been awarded many times with decorations, diplomas, and prizes, both foreign and domestic. He is the winner of 72 decorations and awards, including 14 foreign ones. In 2014, in recognition of his outstanding merits for the development of beekeeping and for his achievements in research work, he was awarded by the President of Poland the Commander’s Cross of the Order of Polonia Restituta.

Although he retired 26 years ago (in 1996), he was very active until the end of his life and worked intensively in science. Now that he was retired, he did not receive any grants—all costs of travel, accommodation, and research were covered by himself.

Many studies by Prof. Woyke were groundbreaking for the science and practice of beekeeping. The Professor’s research completely changed the views and results of previous publications on the biology of bees. Here are some examples from recent years:

In a bee colony, eggs are laid by the queen bee. However, when the queen is absent, the eggs are laid by worker bees. The workers are smaller than queens. It was obvious that the little workers lay smaller eggs than a queen. However, Prof. Woyke found that the eggs laid by worker bees are larger than those laid by queens. He explained that this is because the queen lays a lot of eggs (up to 2,000 a day), and the worker bee many times less (Gençer & Woyke, 2007).

All publications to that point described that in Asian giant bees Apis dorsata, queens and drones perform mating flights in so-called evening flights. However, Woyke showed that worker bees also fly during these flights, and in some periods there are no queens and no drones. So what was described as flights of queens and drones were actually flights of worker bees (Woyke et al., 2007).

Woyke worked on the artificial insemination of queen bees. This is the only way to control parental selection in bees as natural insemination takes place high in the air. In a paper on the artificial insemination of queen bees, he showed that the number of scientific papers written by him and his students equals or exceeds those written by all other authors in the world (Woyke, Jasiński, et al., 2008a).

Woyke described that Asian bees, A. laboriosa in Nepal, Apis dorsata in India, and A. d. breviligula in the Philippines defend themselves against pests (hornets) by making defensive turns of the body, which deters attackers. This work was for several years the most downloaded publication from this Journal (Woyke, Wilde, et al., 2008b).

A queen bee mates high in the air. This phenomenon was described as early as 1792 and since then it has been described many times in about 200 publications. However, research by Woyke (2011) completely changed the views on the course of this phenomenon. He showed that the mating sign with which the queen returns from the mating flight comes not from one but from two drones. Up to that point, no one has not only not mentioned such a phenomenon but has not even imagined that could be possible.

Giant and rock bees build their nests under the branches of large trees or under rock overhangs. They do not stay in the same place all year round. Depending on the amount of nectar available, they roam. At certain times, there is a lot of honey in the nests, and at other times there is a lack of it. You cannot look into the nests of such bees like a beehive and check how much honey there is. Prof. Woyke stated that these bees perform periodic flights from time to time, which looks like they are swarming. These flights have been described as repelling hornets or helping to regulate temperature. In contrast to this, Woyke et al. (2012a) stated that the daily number of such flights depends on the well-being of the colony. During the period of maximum development and a large amount of honey in the nest, they make 6 such flights a day, and in the period when they are preparing for migration and there is no honey in the nest, they make only 1 or do not make them at all, even for several days. Thus, without looking into the nest, you can be sure when there is honey in the nest or when there is no honey.

In countries like Nepal, India, and Bhutan, about 70% of honey comes from wild rock and giant bees. All rock bees and many giant bees build their nests under rock cliffs. The predatory hunting of honey has caused the population of these bees to decrease. To save these bee species, two large international projects were set up to study which rock cliffs wild bees select as nesting sites. The idea was to protect these places. Reports have been published detailing nesting height, distance from water, exposure to cardinal directions, and more. However, both reports stated that it is not known why bees nest in some places and not in others. Prof. Woyke found that in the Himalayas, bees build their nests under the unrotten overhangs of rock cliffs. He also explained that building combs on solid rock prevents the nest from collapsing. It is now known which cliffs need to be protected to provide nesting sites for these bees (Woyke et al., 2012b).

More achievements of Jerzy Woyke can be read and downloaded on his scientific profiles on ResearchGate, Google Scholar, and Academia, as well as on Facebook (https://www.facebook.com/jerzy.woyke).

The Professor’s achievements, which are significant on a global scale, place him among the individuals who have enriched the knowledge about honey bees through groundbreaking discoveries and had a revolutionary impact on the development of beekeeping science and practice. It is no exaggeration to say that Prof. Woyke was a world-renowned bee researcher. He was probably the oldest active apidologist in the world. He consistently made Polish science famous abroad. The extent to which Prof. Woyke was recognized and respected in the world is evidenced by the fact that foreign researchers asked him to direct and improve the methodology of their planned research. In the history of beekeeping science, there has never been a Polish beekeeper-scientist of this caliber. Bees and beekeeping have always been his great love and passion.