Feeding base of beekeeping and measures to expand and improve it
For successful development and high productivity of beekeeping, as well as any branch of animal husbandry, a powerful and stable fodder base is necessary.
The feeding base of beekeeping is honey plants of field crop rotations (fodder, oilseeds, technical, medicinal, melon and some vegetable crops, and from cereals – buckwheat), field-protective, forest, fruit-berry and other plantations, and also many meadows of different natural lands: forests, meadows, plains, beams, ravines.
Bee-bees very often consisting of several hundred bee colonies are authentic beekeeping farms. To ensure the high productivity of large apiaries, it is necessary to organize a stable fodder base, fill the universally occurring impotent periods with sowing of honey grasses and create a “flower-nectary conveyor.”
By natural conditions, Ukraine is divided into five major zones: Polissya, Forest-steppe, the northern steppe, southern. Steppe and mountainous regions of the Carpathians. Beekeeping is successfully developing in all these zones.
In Lesostepi and Polissya, there are many good honey-bearing plants in the woods among woody, shrubby, semi-shrubby and herbaceous plants.
Forest vegetation gives the bees the earliest spring bribes, when there are still no flowering plants in the fields and meadows. This bribe is rich not only with nectar, but also with pollen, which is extremely necessary for the spring development of bee colonies. In many cases, forest vegetation provides and obtaining from the apiary of marketable honey.
Many good honey plants are found in meadows, and in floodplains in floodplains of rivers and their numerous tributaries.
But the main food base of beekeeping in these zones is the sowing of various agricultural crops, especially buckwheat, as well as fruit and berry and shelterbelts.
In the Steppe, the main meats are field crops, fruit
Flowers of bee-dusted plants and their release of nectar.
Bees eat nectar and pollen, allocated flowers. Consequently, their existence depends on the presence of flowers in nature. In turn, flowers, which are the organs of plant reproduction, often need to be pollinated by bees so that fruits and seeds can form from them.
Flowers have male organs – stamens that contain pollen, that is, male sex cells. Besides them, there are also female organs – pistils. The thickened lower part of the pistil is called the ovary, the middle part is the column, and the upper part is called the stigma. The stamen consists of a thread and anther. The pollen grains are produced in the anther. For the fertilization of the flower, it is necessary that the pollen falls on the stigma of the pistil. Pollen seed hitting on the stigma of the pistil, sprouting, and this sprout penetrates into the ovary, where it joins (merges) with the ovule. After this, the ovary begins to grow and turns into a fruit. If the pollen does not fall on the stigma, then the fruit does not form, and the flower fades. In the ovary of the flower are the ovules developing after fertilization into the seeds.
When pollinating the plant with its pollen (self-pollination), the seeds are less viable than pollen pollen from another plant of the same species. Pollination of a plant’s flower by the pollen of another plant is called cross pollination.
Plants have a number of adaptations to the fact that instead of self-pollination they undergo cross-pollination. Some plants have separate masculine (with stamens) and separate female (with pestles) flowers on the same plant. Such plants are called monoecious.
Sometimes it happens that the female flowers are on the same plant, and the male flowers on the other. These are willow cannabis, hops and others. They are called dioecious. There are plants in which the stamens and pistils do not mature at the same time. In apple, for example, the pestle ripens earlier, and after its withering – anthers. Therefore, some varieties of it are pollinated by others, in which the stamens developed simultaneously with the pestles of the first (pollinated) varieties. In some plants, the stamens are considerably shorter than the pistils, and therefore they do not pollinate the pollen of the same flower.
In wind-polluted plants, the pollen is transferred by the wind to the insects pollinated by insects, mainly bees. The flowers of most plants pollinated by insects have a bright color or smell. On the contrary, polluted by the wind do not have these signs (for example, rye, oats hazel, birch and others).
Flowers and those insects that carry their pollen are mutually adapted. This relationship between them has developed over the millennia.
Some plants have special devices for pollination of flowers by large insects (bumblebees and bees). Thus, the sage in the lower part of the filamentous filament has a lever on the side preventing the insect from reaching the nectar located on the bottom of the calyx flower. Pushing towards the nectar, the bee presses the lever, and the anther reaches it on the back, and pollen is poured out of it. Hairs on the back of the bee retain the seeds of pollen. Visiting another flower, the bee touches the back of its hanging down pistil, and the pollen sticks to its stigma. Thus, pollination occurs. To attract vectors of pollen – bees and other insects – plants give off sweet juice. It is a sugar liquid, the so-called nectar, which is the main food for bees. It is produced by special glands of plants – nectaries, located mostly at the bottom of the flower. Plants having nectaries and secreting nectar are called nectariferous or melliferous.
Nectaries are glands that produce sweet juice and consist of a small group of small cells covered with larger ones. Plants that have nectaries and produce nectarean or melliferous. Nectaries are glands that produce sweet juice and consist of a small group of small cells covered with larger ones. Plants that have nectaries and allocate nectarean or melliferous.
Nectaries are usually found on sepals, pistils, petals or on stamens, less often on green parts of the plant, for example, in cornflowers they are located on bracts; in cotton, a part of nectaries is located on leaves. Therefore, nectaries are divided into flowering and non-flowered. But plants with non-flowered nectaries are few.
However, from the fact that there are nectaries in the flower, it does not follow that there is always nectar in them. Nectar is released only if the plant is in favorable conditions of heat and humidity.
The amount of nectar released in different plants is not the same. This is due to the biological properties of plants and the development of their flowers. In addition, the selection of nectar by plants depends to a large extent on climatic and soil conditions, as well as on weather conditions.
Some species of plants can allocate nectar in significant quantities (for example, linden, white acacia, sainfoin, phacelia, buckwheat, etc.), and others in smaller ones.
Isolation of nectar begins, mainly, simultaneously with the opening of anthers, reaches a maximum during pollination of the flower and ceases with the onset of the formation of the fetus. In many plants, the nectar is most prominent in the morning with the opening of the flower and up to 11 o’clock in the afternoon, after which until 3 o’clock in the afternoon the amount of it decreases, and then may again increase somewhat. However, not all melliferous plants behave this way. For example, in a favorable weather, the phacelia gives off nectar well at noon.
Humidity of air has a strong influence on the release of nectar. Most plants produce much more abundant nectar in warm, wet weather and in the absence of wind, and ceases its allocation in hot weather, cold snaps, and inclement weather. If after rainy time a number of clear sunny days follow, then most of the nectar is released in the first days of the established warm weather.
The moisture of the soil contributes to the release of nectar, and the amount and sugar content usually increase. Therefore, agricultural techniques, aimed at preserving moisture in the soil (for example, loosening rows), and increase the nectar production of plants.
The same plant, depending on the composition of the soil and other soil conditions, can give off a greater or lesser amount of nectar. For example, white mustard and phacelium give more nectar on calcareous and calcareous-sandy soils than on clayey soils; sainfoin – on soils of calcareous more than on sandy soils; alfalfa and clover abundantly secrete nectar on calcareous and fertilized with gypsum soils. More fertile: soil promotes increased nectar release.
The isolation of nectar by cultivated plants depends to a very great extent on the level of farming used in their cultivation. The better the plants are, the more abundant they are that secrete nectar.
In the case of broad-sowing of clover and other plants, nectar is more abundant than in the ordinary ordinary.
All activities aimed at increasing the crop of this culture, also increase the allocation of nectar.
The main honey plants.
Among the main agricultural field crops there is a large number of very valuable honey plants. They in many places give the main honey collector. In the forest-steppe part of Ukraine and Polesie, these plants are especially important for beekeeping; have: buckwheat, perennial fodder grasses (sainfoin clover, alfalfa), annual grasses (vetch, seradella rank), oilseeds and technical (mustard, rapeseed, sunflower, etc.), medicinal, melon crops, etc.
Buckwheat.
Buckwheat is an annual herbaceous plant of the buckwheat family. The stalk of buckwheat is tall, branching, reaches a height of 70-90 cm. Buckwheat leaves are broad, serrate, flowers of white and pink color collected in a brush.
Buckwheat is a valuable cereal crop. Its grain contains a large number of proteins, starch, phosphate salts and iron. Ashes of buckwheat straw contain about 40% of potassium. Buckwheat can be used to feed cattle. Stubble crops buckwheat give good silage.
Buckwheat has a short growing season (70-85 days). It is able to use sparingly soluble phosphorus fertilizers. It can grow on sandy and acidic soils. It is characterized by rapid growth, which helps it to drown out the weed vegetation. Previously, buckwheat was wrongly considered a culture that was demanding of the soil, climate and agrotechnics of cultivation. It was sown on poor predecessors, on infertile and poorly cultivated areas. Fertilizers for buckwheat, as a rule, were not introduced, sowing was done manually. As a result, low and unstable buckwheat yields were obtained, not exceeding an average of 6-7 centners per hectare.
Sainfoin.
In our country of a large number of sainfoins cultivated three:
1. asparagus vicious, or European;
2. the asparagus sand;
3. aspartic Transcaucasus.
Esparcet European – is distributed mainly in the Ukraine (except for the southern regions and Polissya) and somewhat less in the Kursk, Voronezh, Rostov regions and the Krasnodar Territory. Varieties of European sainfoin are characterized by a dark color of the leaves and a considerably widening downward, ovoid shape of the flower brush. In the year of sowing, it forms a basal rosette; blooms in the second year and gives one grapes. The height of the grass stand is 40-70 cm, the stems are thin, inside are made or half-filled.
Espartzet sand is widely distributed in the wild, rarely cultivated. It differs from the unhygienic shoots. Leaves on young shoots of light yellow-green color. Blooms for the second year, for 10-20 days! Later, the European sainfoin, and gives 1-2 hay cuttings. Espartcet Transcaucasian is the most common in Armenia, Georgia and Azerbaijan. It is characterized by thick half-full stems. The flower brush is cylindrical, wide, almost even along the entire length.
Transcaucasian saints for their biological characteristics are divided into 3 groups. The first group includes varieties that bloom in the sowing year and give 1-2 hay cuttings. In the second and subsequent years, they give 2-3 hay cuttings.
The height of the grass stand is 70-100 cm, the stems inside are hollow and tender; bloom almost simultaneously with the European sainfoin.
The second group includes odnoukosnye Transcaucasian sainfoins with executed or half-filled stems. They blossom and ripen 3-5 days after the first group; mainly in Armenia and Georgia. The third group includes intermediate varieties and various local populations.
Espartcet Transcaucasian everywhere turns out to be much more productive on the haystack than European sainfoin.
Esparset is one of the best honey plants of field crop rotations. In conditions of high agrotechnics, with favorable weather, the flowers of the sainfoin give the bees abundant, comparatively early bribes of nectar and pollen. The sainfoin will blossom at the end of May, and in the northern regions of its cultivation – in early June. At this time there is still little blossom of honey plants, as the spring honeycombs are already flowering, and the summer flowers are not yet blooming.
Espartet successfully fills this for many areas without a period. The duration of flowering varies from 3 to 4 weeks, depending on the weather conditions.
The flower of the sainfoin is of the butterfly type, consists of a greenish calyx, a bright pink corolla (with varieties of separate varieties from pale pink, almost fodder, to pinkish-red hues) and 10 stamens, of which 9 are fused, surrounding the pestle. The annular surface of the flower-bed between the base of the stamens and the pistil; is a nectariferous tissue. On it, and accumulates nectar.
Nectar, collected by bees from sainfoin flowers, is almost colorless in small amounts, in large amounts – with a slight yellowish tinge. The concentration of sugar in nectar depends on the weather conditions. In wet weather, it is smaller, in dry weather – large. The allocation of nectar flowers in sainfoin, as in other plants, is very variable; The conditions of growth (agrotechnics and weather conditions) most sharply affect it. A different amount of nectar is allocated by separate flowers also depending on the phase of their development and the location in the inflorescence. The positive effect on the release of nectar has an increase in soil moisture.
Isolation of nectar with flowers of sainfoin is closely connected with the air temperature.
As the temperature of the air decreases, so does the release of nectar; on the contrary, with increasing temperature, it usually increases. The greatest excretion of nectar with flowers of sainfoin was observed at daytime temperatures of 22-25 њ C.
A very great influence on the selection of nectar by the flowers of the sainfoin is provided by the techniques of agrotechnics used when growing it on seeds. Thus, with wide-sowing sowing, the sainfoin allocates nectar more than in the ordinary.
It also significantly increases the release of nectar and the use of fertilizers.
Esparcet is a valuable honey culture that blooms early in the spring and promotes the rapid growth of bees and preparing them for the main bribe. Even the families of bees that come out of wintering medium in strength, give commodity honey and wax. The sarcophagus sword also helps to obtain early layers. Honey from sainfoil of excellent quality, bees on it well winter.
Since the flowers of the sainfoin allocate the greatest amount of nectar in the first half of the flowering, the bees manage to sometimes collect a certain amount of nectar even when mown to hay.
The main importance for honey picking is the testis of sainfoin.
In addition, the sainfoin is widely used in pre-fodder fodder crop rotations. In many areas it is sown on the reserve sites.
It should be noted that the separation of nectar with sainfoin flowers, with strict implementation of modern agrotechnical requirements, can be significantly increased.
So, the mere application of broad-sowing crops and the proper fertilization of the soil can almost double the amount of nectar extracted from the sainfoin flowers.
However, the appropriate selection of varieties and varieties of sainfoins is quite possible to significantly extend the period of its flowering and provide bees with a longer (up to 1.5 months) bribes.
Since the sainfoin blooms relatively early, the bee colonies of small strength do not have enough time to develop and build up a large number of worker bees by this time. In most cases, such bee colonies are only developed at the expense of a bribe from a sainfoin and come into force for subsequent bribes. Therefore, the timely preparation of bee colonies for it is of great importance for increasing the sesame harvest. High medosbori give only strong families, having a large number of bees – nectar gatherers.
The most reliable method of training bees to bribe from sainfoin in Ukraine today is the organization of very strong families with assisted uterus. The presence of the latter has been instrumental in the early spring for the rapid growth of young, efficient bees. The same results can be achieved with single-family maintenance of families, if the right care is taken and pedigree work is carried out on apiaries. In this way, by the time of blossoming of sainfoin it is quite possible to get families whose bees occupy 20 or more standard frames during this period. Proper preparation of bees for blossoming sainfoin can greatly increase the honey collection from it.
Donnik – annual and biennial plants from the family of legumes.
The clover should be concentrated mainly in the arid zone of our country, as it has a high drought resistance.
In the area where the clover is sown, the clover plays only an auxiliary role to improve the sands.
It can be widely used as a crop for silage, and in more dry areas – and for pastures. The Donnik in a mixture with annual grasses is a part of a number of green conveyors.
Podnikov sweet clover increases the period of flowering and honey harvesting almost 2 times.
In areas where considerable area was allocated for the sowing campaign, the profit of the control hive on individual days reached during the flowering of the clover to 10-12 kg per day.
Sowing simultaneously yellow and white two-year-olds and annual sweet-mantles, and also applying strips of a part of crops, it is possible to create a continuous continuous bees taken in a sweet clover (“conveyor belt”).
The yellow clover begins to blossom before others, behind it blossoms white, and later all bloom annual sweetbirds, blooming almost to frost.
The seeds of the sweet clover before sowing require special treatment – stratification. Seed germination should be up to 80-90%.
Seeds of unequal germination (with an admixture of solid seeds not freed from the film) can, as they germinate, clog the fields in subsequent years. Therefore, an admixture of such seeds is undesirable. Stratification can replace podzimnius sowing, that is, sowing at such a late time so that the seeds do not rise in the autumn, especially since it is probably possible to sow the clover in the spring earlier. Good results are given also by summer crops of the two-year-old clover (in the second half of summer). In this case, the sweet clover has time to develop well until the fall.
When harvesting the clover, attention should be paid to the preservation of the leaves (less to turn over), to obtain the least coarse hay (timely mowing) and leaving a high (15-20 cm) stubble for subsequent regrowth.
When drying the sweet clover it is necessary to be especially wary of molding it, since hay, affected by mold, is completely unsuitable for use. When cleaning seeds, do not allow seeds to be shed, as this can greatly reduce yield and clog the field. Threshing and cleaning of clover seeds is carried out in the same way as clover.
Despite the fact that many varieties of clover are also capable of self-pollination, cross-pollination always gives a greater yield of seeds. The presence of bees near the crops of sweet clover increases the yield of its seeds by 40%. From what has been said it is clear that the sweet clover is valuable not only as an outstanding honey plant, but also as a culture that gives a large amount of green mass used for hay, silage and green fertilizer. Donnik significantly enriches the soil with nitrogen and improves its structure.
Cotton is a technical plant that reaches a height of 1-2 m. Cotton crops are grown in the southern regions of Ukraine.
Several species of cotton are cultivated. The duration of flowering of cotton reaches 70-80 days.
The vernalization of cotton seeds shortens the length of the growing season and is of particular importance in new cottonseed areas. In the case of cotton flowers, anthers are often cracked and the stigma is ready to receive pollen before the flower is opened.
However, some varieties of cotton are pollinated by bees and wasps. Cross-pollination increases the number of bolls, the number of seeds in the capsule also increases, and the yield of fiber increases. It is noticed that when pollination of cotton by bees decreases; oviposition. The transportation of the pollinating apiary directly to cotton crops leads to a marked increase in its yield. The training of bees for pollination of cotton increases the yield of cotton.
Cotton has flowering and non-flowering nectaries. Flower nectaries are narrow nipple cells located between the calyx and corolla (at the base of the calyx) in the form of a nectariferous ring. Between the petals of the corolla, at its base, there are small gaps leading to the nectaries and protected by intertwining hairs that block access to the nectaries by small insects. The bees, thrusting their proboscis through the hairs, can partially use the evolved nectar.
Medoproduktivnost different types of cotton is not the same. Long-fiber and soft-fiber varieties (the so-called Egyptian) are usually visited better than others.
Mustard – we have three species: Sareptian, white and black. The most important is the Sareptian. and the smallest – black.
Mustard is a one-year-old oilseed plant, less often it is sown on green scotch feed and sometimes on silage. Sow mustard early, so that it could grow stronger before the appearance of its pest – fleas, or late, when already past the danger of hitting it with this insect.
The flowers of mustard emit a lot of nectar and are readily visited by bees. It blooms under favorable conditions a month after sowing and blossoms for about three weeks. Hectar of mustard gives an average of 30-40 kg of honey.
Mustard has a short growing season and is quite suitable for use as a stubble crop to create a late bribe to bees.
Rapeseed and winter rape are valuable oilseeds and honey plants. The culture of winter rape is especially widespread in the southwestern regions of Ukraine – in Vinnytsia, Khmelnitsky and Cherkassy regions. Spring rape is sown more in the left-bank forest-steppe, where it is also known as the kolz. Winter canola canola blooms in May and gives good early bribes to bees, and spring rape in June; flowering lasts about three weeks. During this time bees have a good bribe from him.
Sunflower is the most common oil plant in the steppe part of Ukraine. In many places in the south and south-east it is one of the main honey plants that provide bees with the main bribe. Blooms in July and August. Bees collect nectar and pollen from its flowers.
By the sowing of sunflower beekeepers usually bring hives with bees for its pollination and obtaining honey. Sunflower hectare in favorable conditions gives 30-50 or more kilograms of honey.
Often, the sunflower is sown in silage. However, such crops for beekeeping are not of great importance, since for this purpose the sunflower is sown very densely and small baskets with a small number of flowers develop on plants. In addition to silage, the sunflower is mown at the beginning of flowering.
Among medicinal and oil-oil plants, both cultivated and wild, a large number of good honey-bearing plants are found. Of these, the following are of great importance for beekeeping: valerian, mint, angelica officinalis, lemon balm, sage pharmacy, lavender, hyssop, snakehead and coriander.
Valerian is found in several species in the wild, as well as in culture. In the wild, it grows on damp meadows, in shrubs, along forest edges, and in the forest-steppe zone – among steppe grasses. Blossoms from the middle of June to the middle of August, is well visited by bees. All its varieties are of medicinal importance.
Peppermint is cultivated to obtain mint oil. Blooms for a long time, almost the entire second half of the summer, and its flowers are well visited by bees. More melliferous is the Jerusalem mint.
Angelica officinalis occurs wild in forest areas, cultivated as a medicinal plant on moist soils. Blossoms angelica in July and August, its flowers are well visited by bees.
Melissa, or mint lemon, is considered one of the best honey plants, most readily visited by bees.
Melissa is bred for melissa oil. When sowing, it blooms for a second year. It is often bred by dividing bushes.
Sage pharmacy is cultured to produce leaves that are used for medicinal purposes. It blooms for the second year and blossoms an extended period in the second half of the summer. Sage flowers give off a lot of nectar and are readily visited by bees. Other types of sage-sage mulia and clary muscat are also excellent honey-plants, often found in wastelands, beams and ravines.
Lavender Has become widespread in culture. It is a very valuable etheriferous plant, well visited by bees.
Hyssop – a medicinal and honey plant, which we meet in wild form along the chalk spurs. Hyssop is a perennial plant. Its flowers are well visited by bees.
The snakehead is cultivated to produce an essential oil. This is an annual plant with purple and whitish flowers. Blooms in July and August, is readily visited by bees. According to the Ukrainian Research Station for Beekeeping, one hectare of the snakehead can yield up to 275 kg of honey.
Coriander is a valuable ethereal and honey plant. It is cultivated for obtaining valuable essential oil, used in the food and perfume industry.
Leaves and flowers of coriander have a sharp, unpleasant smell of bedbugs. Ripened seeds lose this smell and have a pleasant spicy taste.
Blossoms coriander in June and July. In a number of areas it gives bees very good honey gathering, but in some localities they are visited poorly.
Melon plants . From vegetable and melon crops, many cucumbers give bees to many bees. When sowing cucumbers in large areas they provide good honey gathering.
In a large number of bees visit and pumpkin flowers. In addition to the pumpkin canteen, in recent years, large areas of forage gourds have been widely developed in forage grass-crop rotations; flowers are readily visited by bees.
Less than cucumbers, give nectar bees melons and watermelons, although they are well visited by bees. On melons, except flower nectar, bees at the end of summer often also collect the juice of broken watermelons, especially in the impotent period. With the condensed juice of watermelons, beekeepers sometimes feed bees during their autumn build-up, but should not leave this food for the winter.
Despite the good selection of nectar with vegetable and melon crops, they give honey bees some honey, as the number of flowers per unit area they have small.
Bees also visit well the flowers of testes of vegetable crops: onions, carrots, cabbage, radishes, radishes, sugar beets, etc. Bows of nectar and pale-green pollen are especially abundant. Testes of vegetable crops, as well as fodder crops (carrots, turnips, etc.) in some farms are sown in large areas and may be important for honey gathering.
Fruit and berry honey plants.
Plantations of fruit and berry crops in our country every year occupy ever larger areas. Trees and shrubs of these plantations give bees a valuable bribe, especially since they bloom at a time when other flowering plants are still very few. Early bribes from fruit and berry crops are of great importance for; development of bee colonies. During their flowering the queen bees always noticeably increase egg laying.
Apiaries, located in large industrial plantations, with favorable weather give and commodity, the yield of honey. For the successful use of a bribe from fruit and berry crops, the organization is of particular importance; a good wintering of strong bee colonies so that during the flowering of the gardens, the families had the greatest number of flying bees.
First of all, in the second half of April, peaches and apricots blossom. The flowering period is very short – 4-6 days.
Plantations of cherry, cherry and plum are widespread throughout the country. In Ukraine, they often give a good early bribe, as they blossom at the end of April and blossom 10-14 days.
Following, cherry blossoms pears and apple trees. The apple tree occupies the main areas in all large industrial plantings. Its flowering lasts 8-10 days.
Of the berry bushes most bloom early; gooseberries, red, black and white currants. They blossom somewhat before the cherry, in the second half of April, and bloom for 8-10 days. Their flowering usually coincides with the work in the apiary on a detailed spring survey of bee colonies (with the main spring survey).
Much later, at the end of May – June, raspberry blooms. Its flowers produce the greatest amount of nectar in comparison with all other plants of fruit and berry plantations and are visited by bees in the early morning until late in the evening. Visits by their bees were noted even after sunset and during a shallow warm rain. Honey production of fruit trees is small: 15-35 kg of honey per hectare. This is explained by the small size of the crowns of these trees and the relatively small number of trees per unit area. The greatest amount of up to 70, and sometimes up to 100 or more kilograms per hectare, is given by plantations of raspberry.
In addition to cultivars, a lot of fruit and berry breeds are found in wild or feral conditions along copses, ravines and beams. In recent years, these rocks in a significant amount are introduced into field shelterbelts.
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