In order to properly organize care for bees in an apiary, it is necessary to provide them with conditions as close to natural as possible. First of all, it is worth finding out what these insects eat in natural conditions. The nutrition features of different age groups of honey bees will be discussed below.

Did you know? The average bee family drinks 2 glasses of water per day.

What do bees eat?

Worker bees collect pollen and nectar from the flowers of various plants. Pollen adheres directly to the bee’s body, to all its hairs, including invisible, nectar is carried in the goiter, where it is partially converted to honey. An enzyme called invertase is produced in the goiter of the toiler, which separates nectar into cane and fruit sugar, but this product is not final. Along the way to the hive, part of the nectar, from 20 to 40%, is spent by the working bee on the restoration of strength, which is its main nutrition.

Having reached the hive, the insect suspends a drop of partially processed nectar on the top of the honeycomb cell. If nectar contains a large amount of water, then it begins to evaporate quickly, which is why bees have to ventilate their own home well. They do this by actively moving their wings. Fermentation continues to occur in nectar at this time. With a moisture content of 20% in nectar, it is already almost ready honey.Once this humidity threshold is reached, the working bees seal the honeycomb with a thin layer of wax secreted by their own body. In sealed honeycombs, honey comes to the necessary condition. Bees create this material in the summer to provide their family with food for the winter. To feed the babies, bees use royal jelly, bee bread or bee bread, as well as liquefied honey. Royal jelly is given to the larvae in the first 3 days of their life after hatching from eggs.

Did you know? Feeding for one larva takes 2 min for a bee-nurse. 15 sec

Milk is secreted by nurse bees (a separate class of working bees) from special glands located near the mouth. Each of these bees takes care of several larvae of the same age. Perga is pollen rammed into honeycombs, subjected to lactic acid fermentation with the addition of bee saliva, filled with honey and sealed with wax. The substance contains amino acids, enzymes and protein necessary for the full development of the brood.A small part of the bee bread is located in the immediate vicinity of the brood. The bulk of the stock of bee bread is in the lower part of the nesting compartment. If in spring there is a sufficient amount of bee bread in the nest, the uterus begins to immediately worm, which allows you to grow a full-fledged new offspring of working bees before the first honey collection. If the bee bread was completely eaten during the winter and in the spring it is not in the nest, the uterus does not lay eggs, but expects the appearance of new pollen.

Important! Top dressing in the spring and summer is carried out in the non-lethal period.

A small number of cells located next to the brood are water. These stocks are not global, but they are enough to maintain optimal humidity in the hive and thin the honey intended for feeding the larvae. The uterus is also under the care of working bees. Initially, it feeds on royal jelly, and a little later it starts to extract honey on its own from sealed honeycombs in the hive. Worker bees feed young drones the first 3 days with royal jelly, then with bee bread and honey.When the male grows up, he begins to independently extract honey from the honeycombs. Gathering honey in the goiter, in the summer, the male can make 3-4 departures per day, returning home with a completely empty goiter. In the summer, drones can eat not only honey harvested by their own bee family, but also fly into other people's hives. In the summer, guard bees launch all the drones indiscriminately into the hive, which gives them the opportunity to eat when they like.

Preparatory work before feeding

Before feeding, you need to remove from the nests all the frames with poor-quality honey (honeydew, rapidly crystallizing). Before opening the nest, you need to calm the bees, for which smoke is used. The main thing is not to overdo it with "sedative" - ​​a large amount of smoke causes aggression in bees. For feeding, it is better to choose a sunny, calm day.Because in cloudy, windy or rainy weather, even with the help of smoke, the aggression of insects is difficult to contain. First, the smoke is let into the summer - literally 2-3 servings, then, when the insects drink a little honey, after about 10 minutes, remove the lid and fumigate the hive from above.

Rules and features of feeding bees

Feeding sugar syrup to many domestic beekeepers is perceived with hostility, while foreign colleagues actively practice sugar feeding.

Time spent feeding makes it possible:

• to avoid swarming of bees in the bezbyzdny period;
• eliminate problems with a lack of food in the winter;
• increase the strength of the bee family before leaving for the winter;
• to prevent diseases and parasites that are dangerous for honey bees.

Important! It is always necessary to clearly monitor from which plants honey insects collect food and adjust their diet. For example, rose hip, lupine and poppy give only pollen.

Spring feeding is started as soon as the inhabitants of the apiary begin to fly out of the nest and fly around in search of food. In summer, top dressing is carried out in mid-July - mid-August, when there is only pollen on the flowers and no nectar. And this naturally allows bees to properly prepare sugar syrup and make supplies for the winter on time. The optimal time for feeding the bees with sugar syrup before wintering is from August 25 to September 5. During this period, usually there is still warm weather, which makes it easier for bees to process sugar. In winter, feed is added as needed.

In total, 2 types of top dressing are distinguished, differing in purpose:

• stimulating;
• the main substitute for food, when there is nowhere to get nectar.

Depending on the type of top dressing, the density of the syrup will vary. For the main feeding, a thicker mixture is used at the rate of 1 liter of water per 2 kg of sugar. Sugar is added to boiling water and stirred until completely dissolved. The mixture is cooled to a temperature of + 35 ° C and then served in the hives. For the preparation of liquid syrup, a proportion of 1: 1 is observed.

Important! The whole stock of honey cannot be left in the hive for the winter. Insects need free space to form a club.

You can dissolve sugar in a similar way by adding it to boiling water or put the mixture for the whole day in a well-lit place, stirring occasionally. The feed is placed in the feeders. The most successful option that meets the requirements of quality and safety is a wooden feeder, which has the form of a flat box.

Her device requires 2 compartments:

• for feed;
• for the bees to enter the feeder.

If you put the food in deep containers, you can lose most of the swarm, because the bees will sink in the liquid. Before use, a new feeder is doused with drying oil, and the joints are worked out with wax. The feeder is placed on the frame directly above the bee's nest. The slot, which is the entrance to the feeding trough, should be located above the place, which is freely accessible by insects.

For liquid feed, you can use a regular jar, closed with a plastic lid. In the lid, make holes with a diameter of 0.8 mm. The jar is installed in the hive upside down. It is better to use a liter container - it will be more convenient to use.

In August - September, an audit is carried out. Fully inspect the hive and calculate the amount of honey. Each normal honeycomb contains 1.5-2 kg of honey, everything that is less is not suitable and is removed. This honey is useful for feeding bees in the spring. Then, frames with honey are set, the last 2, that is, located at the very top should be with a feather.

The specifics of winter feeding

Any invasions in the winter are difficult for bees and put their life at risk. In winter, it is quite difficult to conduct a full inspection of the nests and make a complete picture of the quantitative indicators of feed. In this regard, all families are fed, in which the feed was not enough initially. Winter top dressing is carried out only if wintering takes place in relatively warm conditions. The minimum temperature at which it is possible to open the hive +2 ... + 4 ° C.During wintering on the street, before feeding, the hives are transferred to rooms where the air temperature is above 0 ° C. The most correct option is top dressing with sugar syrup. Prepare it thick enough for 1 liter of water add 2 kg of sugar. Brown honeycombs are filled with syrup, for weak families only one half of the honeycombs are filled. Prepared honeycombs are substituted directly to the bee club. The procedure is best done together.

Step-by-step instructions for feeding bees in winter:

1. Remove the hive cover.
2. Bend the canvas until the bees in the extreme street become visible. At this time, an assistant will be required to illuminate all the frames with a red lamp.
3. Move all frames to the last street with fast, precise movements to make room for the syrup frame.
4. Set the frame directly next to the club and slide everything as it was.

With a good dense filling, the cell contains 1.5-2 kg of feed, which will be enough for a month. After this period of time, feeding is again carried out, if heat has not yet arrived. If the hive has high enough humidity, then top dressing is carried out using candi. They make it from honey and sugar. Kandy consistency should resemble a thick plastic dough. This feed per month will require 1 kg. Pre Candi wrapped in gauze in 1 layer.Place it also, directly next to the swarm. Winter food frames are located at the top of the hive. In winter, the bees eat the harvested products and move up. If the frames with poorly filled honeycombs will be in the central part, in winter the club will begin to split, scattering into different cells, which will lead to hypothermia of the hive. In winter, it is very important to add food frames on time.

How to calculate feed consumption

For the bee family for the winter you need to leave 20-30 kg of honey. Based on these calculations, they decide whether to introduce additional nutrition. In the hive, they don’t leave all 20-30 kg of honey products - they place exactly as many frames as there are honeycombs with bees.

The number of frames with food directly depends on the strength of the bee family:

• strong - 8-10 hundred;
• medium - 6 hundred;
• nuclei - 3-4 cells.

Each honeycomb on average holds 1.5 kg of honey or syrup. Accordingly, if 8-10 cells remain, honey remains in the hive 12-15 kg. In this case, winter feeding is most likely not required. Honeycombs with stored honey can be added in early spring (late February - early March) to start the process of egg laying in the uterus. To feed brood and feed in spring, bees will need 10-12 honeycombs, 2 of which should be with a feather. At the time of the first spring bribe, 4 kg of honey should remain in the hive.

In what cases is feeding not necessary?

Feeding is not needed if the insects have stocked up with a sufficient amount of high-quality honey - not crystallizing, not scum. In the summer, if there are plants in the district that bloom for a long period, feeding with syrup will also not be needed. If there is enough nectar, then by autumn the toilers stock up on honey in abundance.

Then top dressing is carried out only at the beginning of September in order to increase the fertility of the uterus and form a large strong family with new working bees. For the proper organization of care for the apiary, you must first know what bees eat in the wild. Accurate feed calculations and quality control can significantly reduce insect loss in the winter.