It deals with rearing and maintenance of honeybees for the production of honey on a commercial scale.
Different Bee Castes
Every honey bee colony comprises of a single queen, a few hundred drones and several thousand worker castes of honey bees. Queen is a fertile, functional female, worker is an unfertile female and the drone is a fertile male.
Honey bee species are social insects which live in colonies. A bee colony comprises of three different castes which perform different duties.
Duties of a queen
- The only individual which lays eggs in a colony (Mother of all bees).
- Lays upto 2000/day in Apis mellifera.
- Five to Ten days after emergence, she mates with drones in one or more nuptial flights.
- When her spermatheca is filled with sperms, she will start laying eggs and will not mate any more.
- She lives for 3 years.
- The secretion from mandibular gland of the queen is called queen’s substance.
- The queen substance if present in sufficient quantity performs following functions.
- Prevent swarming and absconding of colonies.
- Prevent development of ovary in workers.
- Colony cohesion is maintained.
- The queen can lay either fertilized or sterile eggs depending on the requirement.
Duties of a drone
- Their important duty is to fertilize the queen.
- They also help in maintenance of hive temperature.
- They cannot collect nectar / pollen and they do not possess a sting.
Duties of a worker
Their adult life span of around 6 weeks can be divided into
a) House hold duty- First three weeks-
b) Out door duty- Rest of the life-
a) House hold duty (First three weeks confined in hive and are called House bees or Nurse bees)
- Build comb with wax secretion from wax glands.
- Feed the young larvae with royal jelly secreted from hypo pharyngeal gland.
- Feed older larvae with bee-bread (pollen+ honey)
- Feeding and attending queen.
- Feeding drones.
- Cleaning, ventilating and cooling the hive.
- Guarding the hive.
- Evaporating nectar and storing honey.
b) Outdoor duties (After three weeks go out for foraging and are called Field bees or Foraging bees)
- Collecting nectar, pollen, propolis and water.
- Water is collected to cool the hive, to dilute honey and to dilute propolis.
- Propolis is a resinous substance exuded by buds of trees and used to close the crevices in the comb and to make the comb water proof.
- Nectar is stored in crop region of fore gut. It is called as honey stomach. By adding the enzyme Invertase the sucrose of nectar is transferred to fructose and glucose.
- Pollen is important nutrient along with nectar and carried to hive @ 20 mg / load.
- Ripening honey in honey stomach.
General apiary management practices
i. Hive inspection – Opening the hive at least twice a week and inspecting for following details.
- Presence of queen
- Presence of eggs and brood
- Honey and pollen storage
- Hive record to be maintained for each hive
- Presence of bee enemies like wax moth, mite, disease
ii. Expanding brood net
- Done by providing comb foundation sheet in empty frame during honey flow period.
iii. Sugar syrup feeding
- Sugar dissolved in water at 1:1 dilution
- Used to feed bees during dearth period
iv. Supering (Addition of frames in super chamber)
- This is done when brood chamber is filled with bees on all frames are covered
- Comb foundation sheet or constructed comb provided in super chamber
v. Honey extraction
- Bee escape board – Kept between brood and super chamber
- Bees bushed away using brush
- Cells uncapped using uncapping knife
- Honey extracted using honey extractor
- Combs replaced in hive for reuse
vi. Swarm management
- Remove brood frames from strong colony and provide to weak
- Pinch off the queen cells during inspection
- Divide strong colonies into 2 or 3
- Trap and hive primary swarm
vii. Uniting bee colonies – Done by Newspaper method
- Bring colonies side by side by moving 30 cm/day
- Remove queen from weak colony
- Keep a newspaper on top of brood chamber of queen – right colony
- Make holes on the paper
- Keep queenless colony on top
- Close hive entrance (the smell of bees will mix)
- Unite bees to the brood chamber and make it one colony
- Pollen and nectar available only during certain period
- Honey flow season (surplus food source) x Dearth period (Scarcity of food)
- Extremes in climate like summer, winter and monsoon – Need specific management tactics
Honey flow season management (Coincides with spring)
- Provide more space for honey storage by giving CFS or built combs
- Confine queen to brood chamber using queen excluder
- Prevent swarming – As explained
- Prior to honey flow – Provide sugar syrup and build sufficient population
- Divide strong colonies into 2-3 new colonies – if colony multiplication is needed
- Queen rearing technique may be followed to produce new queens for new colonies
- Bees have to survive intense heat and dearth period
- Provide sufficient shade (under trees or artificial structure)
- To increase RH and reduce heat – Sprinkle water twice a day on gunny bag or rice straw put on hive
- Increase ventilation by introducing a splinter between brood and super chamber
- Provide sugar syrup, pollen supplement/substitute and water
- Maintain strong and disease free colonies
- Provide new queen to the hives
- Winter packing in cooler areas (Hilly areas)
Management during dearth period
- Remove empty combs (and store in air tight container)
- Use dummy division board to confine bees to small area
- Unite weak colonies
- Provide sugar syrup, pollen supplement/substitute
Rainy season/monsoon management
- Avoid dampness in apiary site. Provide proper drainage
- In rain when bees are confined to the hive, provide sugar syrup feeding