BEEKEEPING AS AN AGRICULTURAL ACTIVITY

in #farms6 years ago


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Hello friend of the farm in this opportunity I am going to talk about beekeeping is a millenary tradition that involves taking care of a swarm of bees inside beehives, obtaining from them a surplus, honey, you also get other natural products such as propolis, pollen, royal jelly and medicines. The beekeeper is a herder of herds of bees, taking care of them and multiplying them.


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Being a beekeeper is an exciting and varied occupation. It provides the joys of manual and thoughtful work, but also the concerns of those who depend on climate, the protection of biodiversity and the health of their animals.
Beekeeping is a profession strongly linked to sustainability. We do not know traditional (non-industrial) beekeepers who get rich, or speculative investment funds that put money in bees. It is, therefore, a work settled throughout history in the world and rural culture.


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The apiary is the place where all the hives in which the bees inhabit are concentrated. Beehive. Throughout hundreds of thousands of years they have developed their organism and rules of coexistence, to such an extent that they are considered the animals with the highest degree of society.
In many countries beekeeping can generate around 100 thousand direct jobs and can produce more than 57 tons of honey per year.


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The bee apis mellifera. It is the bee species with the greatest distribution in the world. When a beekeeper refers to their beehives it refers to the collectivity of the bees that form a colony, the same family. In a hive the individual yields his value in favor of the collectivity of all bees. That is why it is said that the hive is a super-organism.
The bees, along with other insects, develop a fundamental activity for the feeding of the human being and of all the animals, the pollination

ORGANIZATION OF BEES BY SOCIAL CASTLES:


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QUEEN is the one whose sole function is to lay eggs; she only copulates once in her life and with several drones, therefore the reproductive apparatus is prepared to house this sperm for almost four years; this is due to the prolonged abdomen that the queen possesses.


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WORKER: the workers responsible for collecting nectar and pollen and ovaries are atrophied by the action of the pheromone secreted by the queen and has no reproductive capacity. There is only one special case by which the worker can lay infertile eggs. The colonies that develop from this reproductive option are given the nickname zanganeras hives, the evolution of these colonies, as a rule, is zero. The workers produce honey, royal jelly and wax throughout the year, as well as food for the hive. Once the bees finish the process that takes around three weeks, the beekeepers gather the honey and the jelly so that they can obtain other products. The workers produce honey, royal jelly and wax throughout the year, as well as food for the hive. Once the bees finish the process that takes around three weeks, the beekeepers gather the honey and the jelly so that they can obtain other products.


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ZANGANOS: those who fertilize the queen bee, its reproductive system is fully developed: testicles, seminal vesicles and penis, since its only clear function in life is to ensure that its genetic material lasts in the species. Once the objective is achieved, they die or are thrown out of the colony.


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CAUSES AND EFFECTS OF REZAGO

This delay in beekeeping development has a number of factors that have had a negative impact, among which we have:
AFRICANIZATION
Before the arrival of Africanized bees, the hives were mostly located in places near the main house and there was an acceptable number of producers who owned more than 1,000 hives. Although the number of hives was considerably reduced, The number of wild colonies increased exponentially to reach almost 1,000,000, which compete with modern hives for food and habitat. On the other hand, coupled with the highly defensive behavior, swarming and abandonment of the breeding nest, have ended up discouraging those new beekeepers who would like to work with these insects.
RESISTANCE TO CHANGE
At present, beekeepers continue to manage colonies of Africanized bees, in the same way that European bees worked, forgetting the behavior biology of Africanized bees, since these hybrids require the introduction of some changes in management, such as : minimum separation between beehives of two meters, use of a larger smoker, use of resistant clothing and light colors, indispensable use of veil (mask) and gloves, location of the apiaries minimum of 400 meters of populated centers, control of swarming, capture of swarms, encolmenamiento or trasiego of wild colonies and diminish the sources of disturbance that incite the abandonment of the colonies. All these changes that must be adopted for the proper management of the Africanized bee have been adopted by several beekeepers.
IMPROPER AND DISTORTED PROMOTION
Under a wrong social criterion, it has offered basic courses with a staff of 5-10 beehives per person, without a follow-up program or technical advice that guarantees an adequate continuous training of the growth of the sector. The biggest aggravating factor is in the absence of a global policy where beekeeping is considered an indispensable productive sector in the conservation of biodiversity and in the improvement of productivity through cross-pollination.
RURAL INSECURITY
Framed by robbery and destruction of the hives, by harvesters and / or poachers, who are dedicated to steal honey during the harvest period, usually between November and April, with vandalism actions ranging from the theft of honeycombs, paintings and you rise up to the destruction and burning of the hives. Unfortunately, vandalism against beekeeping is not an exclusive phenomenon in Latin America, it is very common. However, in several countries the looters when they are identified or captured in flagrante delicto are severely punished by law. Likewise, the accidental or caused burning of forests and savannas, not only eliminates the wild colonies, but also the established hives.
LITTLE APICULTURAL CULTURE
When talking about bees, most people automatically associate it with bee stings and honey, forgetting that there are a number of products such as: pollen, propolis, wax, royal jelly, apitoxin and derivatives, honey liqueur. and honey vinegar, in addition to composite products, which can increase the added value of the beekeeping sector. On the other hand, honey is the most vilified product of agricultural origin and about which it is more suspicious about its authenticity. This distrust has generated a series of elements that condition and distort their consumption, namely: The lack of entomophilic pollination culture also undermines the development of our beekeeping.


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POSSIBLE SOLUTIONS
To achieve possible solutions to the problem, we must work on a medium-term and long-term program, involving a joint effort between beekeepers, government and private companies, eliminating immediate and not very credible solutions, taking the successful initiatives undertaken To that end, It is proposed to initiate actions that respond more quickly and have a more lasting impact, such as:
Include beekeeping within educational programs in agricultural careers, as well as in school programs
Study of the biology of Africanized bees
Carry out a selection program that includes several components, namely: bees with hygienic behavior, with greater productivity, more docile.
Include beekeeping within conservation programs and biodiversity improvement, allowing access to beekeepers in national parks, as occurs in Australia, given the conservationist attitude and reforestation of beekeepers.
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Thanks for reading my article.
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https://www.apiservices.biz/es/articulos/ordenar-por-popularidad/1214-rezago-apicultura-venezuela https://ecocolmena.com/la-apicultura/ http://www.abejapedia.com/apicultura/

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Well said @manuelruiz21...we @farms pleased with this publication, this is truly useful to us @farms. Indeed we @farms find this post informative and educative, thanks for sharing

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