Pollen Sources for Honey Bee Colonies at Land with Desert Nature during Dearth Period

Abstract

ABSTRACT. Autumn is a critical period for honey bee colonies and the weak colonies during autumn are likely to be lost during winter. The colonies need good pollen sources during this period to be able to foster enough brood, to boost colonies survival ability during winter. The situation is worse in desert areas where few pollen sources are expected to be existed. Identifying the availability of pollen sources for honey bees at desert areas is very essential to present appropriate recommendations regarding colonies feeding and suitable plants to be cultivated in such areas. Thus, the study objective is to identify pollen sources for honey bee colonies during the autumn at El-Bostan region (a region with desert nature). Samples of bee bread were collected at different times during autumn. The samples were microscopically analyzed and pollen sources were then identified. Nine plants belong to six plant families (Pedaliaceae, Malvaceae, Poaceae, Asteraceae, Myrtaceae, Resedaceae, and Casuarinaceae) were classified as major pollen sources. The most abundant plants were casuarina and eucalyptus during autumn. Beekeepers are advised to supply their colonies regularly (each two weeks) with pollen substitutes or supplements during autumn at El-Bostan region. Honey bee workers tend to mix different pollen types together in bee bread when different pollen sources are available. The number of pollen sources in the bee bread can be used to assess the richness degree of any region with suitable pollen sources to honey bees. The identified pollen sources in this study are recommended to be cultivated in lands with similar desert nature, to provide honey bee colonies with protein feeding during this critical period of the year.

The effects of different levels of protein and silymarin on the population growth and hypopharyngeal gland surface of honey bee workers (Apis mellifera meda)

“…2). Similar to our results using the major antioxidant in green tea epigallocatechin-3-gallate supplementation improved honeybee survival but only at an intermediate dose (0.3-0.5 mM) (Archer et al, 2014a). It seems likely that antioxidants are among the major regulators of many physiological processes and, therefore, a redox balance between antioxidants and prooxidants in the diet, gastro-intestinal tract, plasma and tissues is an important determinant of the state of our health.…”

“…A poor diet, due to land use changes reducing the availability and diversity of floral resources, might help drive these declines (Vanbergen and Initiative, 2013). In keeping with this idea, nutrition is a key determinant of honeybee survival (Altaye et al, 2010;Archer et al, 2014b). Understanding the association between diet and honeybee survival is essential to protect declining and threatened honeybee populations (Pirk et al, 2014).…”

Determining spatio-temporal distribution of bee forage species of Al-Baha region based on ground inventorying supported with GIS applications and Remote Sensed Satellite Image analysis

“…Z. spina-christi was reported as a major honey source plant of eastern Saudi Arabia ( Taha, 2015 ). The importance of having lists of honey bee plants of an area in suitable apiary site selection and cultivating of potential plants for honey bee colonies has been well suggested ( Abou-Shaara, 2015a , Abou-Shaara, 2015b ).…”

“…To identify and inventory honey bee plants; different approaches such as palynological analysis of honey samples, direct observation of foraging bees and analysis of pollen loads and pollen stores in the nest have been used ( Amoko, 1997 , Hepbun and Jocot-Guillarmod, 1991 , Hepbun and Radloff, 1995 , Admasu, 2003 , Abou-Shaara, 2015a , Abou-Shaara, 2015b ). However, these methods only give a general idea as to which plant species the honey bee foragers collected pollen from, and not other co-existing plant species which may flower concurrently and from which resources are also readily available.…”