Plebeia is a genus of mostly small-bodied stingless bees, formerly included in the genus
Trigona. Most of the ~45 species are placed in the subgenus
(Plebeia) (
s.s.), but there also are four species in the subgenus
(Scaura). They differ in only minor structural details, primarily of the hind leg, from other genera that were formerly treated as constituents of
Trigona. In some classifications, the genus
Schwarziana is treated as a subgenus within
Plebeia, but recent morphological analyses indicate that
Schwarziana is a distinct lineage, while
Plebeia is paraphyletic.
Due to their small sizes, in Brazil many species are known as
abelha-mirim (literally "small bee") in Portuguese.
Range: Species of the genus
Plebeia occur from Mexico to Argentina.
A few feral colonies of
P. emerina exist in the United States, the result of experimental imports in the 1950s.
List of species: - P. alvarengai
- P. amydra
- P. asthenes
- P. aurantia [Now placed in genus Plectoplebeia]
- P. catamarcensis
- P. chondra
- P. cora
- P. deceptrix
- P. domiciliorum
- P. droryana
- P. emerina
- P. emerinoides
- P. flavocincta
- P. franki
- P. frontalis
- P. fulvopilosa
- P. goeldiana
- P. grapiuna
- P. guazurary
- P. hyperplastica
- P. jatiformis
- P. julianii
- P. kerri
- P. llorentei
- P. lucii
- P. malaris
- P. manantlensis
- P. margaritae
- P. melanica
- P. meridionalis
- P. mexica
- P. minima
- P. molesta
- P. mosquito
- P. moureana [Now placed in genus Asperplebeia]
- P. mutisi
- P. nigriceps
- P. nigrifacies [Now placed in genus Plectoplebeia]
- P. orphne
- P. parkeri
- P. peruvicola
- P. phrynostoma
- P. plectoforma
- P. pleres
- P. poecilochroa
- P. pulchra
- P. remota
- P. roubiki
- P. saiqui
- P. silveirai
- P. tica [Now placed in genus Asperplebeia]
- P. tigris
- P. tobagoensis
- P. variicolor
- P. vidali
- P. wittmanni