Bee Kingdom. Part One

2024 Author: Gavin MacAdam | [email protected]. Last modified: 2023-12-16 13:38

What could be tastier than your own honey? You will probably know what it is made of, if there are any sugar impurities in it. Your honey is sweeter and healthier. Having thought of starting an apiary, you will gain more than you invest in it. Beekeeping is not easy. It will take a lot of patience before you get your first honey

Bees

Bees are flying insects living in families. Different individuals of the family perform different functions that are strictly observed in the community. The family includes a queen, this is the only bee with a well-developed reproductive system and several dozen worker bees (up to 100 workers), plus several hundred drones, rarely exceeding two thousand. Among the total mass of bees, the queen stands out in size up to 30 mm, the size of a working bee up to 23-25 mm. Also, the uterus is much heavier than the working individual. The life expectancy of the fetal uterus is up to 5 years. The queen bee is the only one of the whole family capable of reproducing offspring, and this is the only thing she does throughout her life. The fetal uterus can lay up to two thousand eggs per day. Worker bees are also female, but with an underdeveloped reproductive system, they cannot reproduce. In a normal bee colony, the life span of a worker varies from 30 to 100 days. Drones are males. Drones don't collect food. Hatching at the beginning of summer, they are expelled from the family by the end of August, the drones perform one of their functions, they fertilize the uterus.

If you decide to keep bees, know that you cannot keep bees of different breeds

Place for an apiary

Before you buy bees, you need to think about where to organize a future apiary. There should be no drainage or compost pits nearby, away from large farmlands, water bodies, and you should also not put hives where high-voltage wires pass. It will be good if there is a forest or grove nearby. The place should be dry, windswept, and have enough shade on hot days. You can put hives in a place where gooseberries or currants grow, the shade from these shrubs will be quite enough. So that the bees do not sting the neighbors, the future apiary is fenced with a solid fence, up to 2 meters high. Bees should have 24/7 access to water and several drinkers should be installed. Weeds should not grow in the chosen place, uproot them, otherwise the weed will interfere with the flight of the bees. It is better not to put hives where there is another apiary nearby, bees can get lost.

You have chosen a place, you have fenced it off, it is time to set up hives. The hives are not simply placed on the ground, otherwise the bottom will freeze and damp. 4 pegs are driven into the ground, and hives are installed on them. The pegs must be at least 30 cm long. The front pegs are driven in three to five centimeters deeper than the rear so that rain water does not get inside. It is also worth considering that the hives should be placed with an "entrance" to the south, southeast or southwest. You need to arrange in rows, for a home apiary this is the most practical.

Equipment for the novice beekeeper

Firstly, the clothes of a novice beekeeper should be light, lint-free, dense, it is better if it is a white long-sleeved robe. Dark clothes irritate bees, they begin to show aggression. Clothes should not be embarrassing, they should be comfortable. It is better to put on rubber gloves on your hands and tuck the sleeves of the robe so that there is no access to the body. You will also need a front mesh, a smoker, a box for transferring frames, a net, a chisel, a wire, a knife, a foundation, a swarm, a honey extractor and a barrier lattice to isolate the uterus.

To be continued