How should Chinese honeybees be kept, and what are the profits like?

The Chinese honeybee (Apis cerana) is a bee species native to our country. It is tolerant of cold and resistant to heat, consumes little feed, and can make use of scattered nectar and pollen sources, making it especially suited to beekeeping in the vast mountainous areas of our country. So how are Chinese honeybees kept? What are the profits like?

1. How are Chinese honeybees kept?

1. Do a good job of queen selection and breeding, and of colony selection

The strength of a colony is directly related to its queen, so queen selection and breeding must be done well. When selecting, choose a queen with good breed characteristics and strong production capacity. A good queen ensures disease resistance and egg-laying capacity. For colony cultivation, the main methods are: (1) Purchasing. Buy bee breeds with excellent characteristics from bee breeding departments. (2) Breeding your own. Select colonies with strong disease resistance and high yield as mother colonies and father colonies to breed queens. In Chinese honeybee production, the queen must be replaced every year to ensure strong colony production. This is because after a Chinese honeybee queen has been used for 1 year, her egg-laying capacity declines, reducing the colony's disease resistance and colony strength

2. Choose the apiary site reasonably

Chinese honeybees have strong adaptability and are not only cold-tolerant but also drought-tolerant. When choosing an apiary site, choose a site rich in nectar sources. On this basis, choose a forest area as the keeping site; in such an area, more than 40% of the trees and plants are nectar sources. Use traditional keeping equipment as bee tools, including back baskets and board boxes. In the management area near the forest, plan and use the forest edge space and nursery space to build a keeping base. Adopt new keeping methods to transfer Chinese honeybees into hives.

3. Transferring Chinese honeybees into hives

For transferring Chinese honeybees from round troughs into hives, first make the hive frame wax sheets, with the height controlled at about 35cm, 2 strips in total, the width controlled at 2cm, 1 strip in total, and the length at about 38cm; leave 1.5cm at both ends of the long strip, fix the wooden strips to both ends of the box with iron nails, and secure them with wire. For the Chinese honeybee comb template, use pure beeswax, melt and press it, and stick it onto the hive frame beam and wire with wax to complete the hive frame. Before transferring, spray the Chinese honeybee box and wax sheets with honey water. Use a bee funnel to collect the colony and shake it into the box. Transfer at night; after the transfer is complete, take down the round trough and put it back with the transferred colony, making sure the hive entrance faces the right way.

4. Colony management

Spring management: In line with the climate change characteristics of the local area, do good insulation work in spring. In early spring, do not remove the insulation materials early, ensure feed supply, and narrow the hive entrance; do not add foundation at will.

Honey flow period management: In this keeping area, July to August is the peak period of plant honey flow in Guangxi, and it is the harvest period for Chinese honeybee keeping production. For management during the honey flow period, ensure the colony's honey-gathering ability and enthusiasm, and ensure high and stable honey production.

Winter management: For winter management, make a management plan according to the winter climate characteristics of the keeping area. This keeping area has a long winter and relatively low temperatures, so management needs to be strengthened.

5. Disease control

The common disease in Chinese honeybee keeping is sacbrood disease, and its onset is concentrated in summer. Because temperature control is inadequate, larvae die and the disease breaks out. In summer, if the temperature is > 35°C, cooling measures are needed. Place the beehive in a cool, ventilated spot to avoid the hive temperature becoming too high. At the same time, pay attention to timely feeding of water and honey to ensure the bees are in a healthy environment. If this disease occurs, use medication treatment. Use honeysuckle (25g), Acanthopanax bark (25g), and Isatis root (25g), add water and decoct, then make into syrup for feeding.

2. What are the profits of Chinese honeybee keeping like?

Chinese honeybees mainly bring returns from honey production. The annual honey production of a Chinese honeybee colony fluctuates around an average of 10 jin. At present, the price of bee honey fluctuates between 100-200 yuan/jin depending on the variety, and the price at which beekeepers sell the most is controlled at around 160 yuan/jin. So the income from 10 Chinese honeybee colonies is about 10*10*160=16,000 yuan; after deducting costs, the income is about 8,500 yuan. However, some site fees of about 2,000 yuan must also be deducted, so the net income from keeping 10 Chinese honeybee colonies in the first year is about 5,500 yuan.