CATDOLL : CATDOLL: What are the benefits of beekeeping?

1. What are the benefits of beekeeping?

Bees can pollinate plants, maintain ecological balance and plant species diversity, and at the same time increase the yield and quality of crops; beekeeping is generally not subject to urban and rural restrictions, does not occupy arable land, and the value of bee products is stable, which can increase the income of beekeepers.

Bees pollinate plants, maintain ecological balance, maintain the diversity of plant species, and at the same time increase the yield and quality of crops; bees also provide bee products such as honey, propolis, royal jelly, etc., which provide basic raw materials for various industrial and civilian products and ensure the health of the people.

Beekeeping is not restricted by urban and rural areas, does not occupy arable land, is pollution-free, can effectively improve the ecology, and the value of bee products is stable, which can significantly increase the income of beekeepers. It is a good way for farmers to get rich. A group of bees can produce 20 to 30 kilograms of honey, several kilograms of royal jelly, and more than 0.25 kilograms of beeswax in a year, and the income is better than a big fat pig. A laborer can raise 50 to 100 bee colonies, and the income is quite considerable.

This article is from: China Agricultural Press "Chinese Soil Varieties"

2. What are the fun places in Shennongjia and what are the must-see attractions for tourists in Shennongjia?

The interesting places in Shennongjia include Taoyuan Scenic Area, Shennongjia Ancient Human Site Tourist Area, Yanziya, Yanzidong, and Songlangshan Scenic Area.

Taoyuan Scenic Area

Taoyuan is located on the east side of Yunmeng Mountain. It is divided into South Taoyuan and North Taoyuan. It is a rare mountaintop basin in Taihang Mountain area. Although it is located on the top of a mountain with an altitude of 500 meters, it is lush with vegetation, fertile soil, and beautiful scenery of the desert. It is said that this is where Guiguzi observed the stars and watched the sunrise.

Taoyuan is located on the east side of Yunmeng Mountain. It is divided into South Taoyuan and North Taoyuan. It is a rare mountaintop basin in Taihang Mountain area. Although it is located on the top of a mountain with an altitude of 500 meters, it is lush with vegetation, fertile soil, and beautiful scenery of the desert. It is said that this is where Guiguzi observed the stars and watched the sunrise.

There are fourteen stone houses in Taoyuan, and their names match the titles of the fourteen chapters of Guiguzi. It is the place where Su Qin and Zhang Yi practiced persuasion. There is a Sun Cave in the south. Legend has it that the sun god hid here to avoid Hou Yi's sharp arrows. Bionics Slope is the place where Xu Fu, Mao Sha, and his friends visited.

Shennongjia is located in the western part of Hubei Province, a mountainous area with towering peaks, stretching between the Yangtze River and the Han River, with an area of ​​3,250 square kilometers. It is said that the ancient Shennong built a frame here to collect herbs. The scenic area has peaks above 3,000 meters above sea level, which can be called the "roof of central China". It is a forest ecological tourism area with beautiful subalpine natural scenery, diverse animal and plant species, and harmonious coexistence of man and nature as its theme.

The main scenic spots in Shennongjia Scenic Area include Shennongding, Fengjingya, Banbiyan, Lookout Tower, Xiaolongtan, Dalongtan, Jinhouling, etc. It is famous for its primitiveness and mystery. The area has high mountains and deep valleys, dense forests, complex and changeable climate, and charming scenery in all seasons. The unique natural environment and human history have created extremely rich and precious natural and cultural landscapes, and also nurtured a pleasant and beautiful tourist environment, which is known as the "Shennong Paradise".

Yanziya is located about 35 kilometers northeast of Shennongjia. Yanziya is high and steep, lush and green, with an altitude of 2,400 meters. It faces Tianmenya from north to south, and is adjacent to the Zizhu River Valley. It is the throat of the transportation between Jianghan in western Hubei.

It is 2,200 meters above sea level, facing Tianmen Pass from north to south, and overlooking Zizhu River Valley. On the half wall on the west side of the pass, there are Huixian Bridge, Scenic Viewing Platform, Yanwu Pavilion and other buildings. Huixian Bridge is said to be the place where Emperor Yan Shennong met with Taishang Laojun. It is said that Shennong persuaded Taishang Laojun to change the alchemy furnace to a metallurgical furnace here. There are some graceful pines and cypresses at the bridge head, and there is a primeval forest under the bridge, full of vitality and beautiful scenery. Climb up to Yanwu Pavilion along the path, and you can enjoy the magnificent view of the sea of ​​clouds and Buddha's light by leaning on the stone railing.

The Swallow Cave Natural Scenic Area is located in the ancient town of Yidou, 50 kilometers south of Shiquan County, and is located on the bank of the Fushui River in the west of Yidou Town in our county. It is a natural stone cave that combines danger, strangeness, seclusion and size. The supernatural Swallow Cave is a group of karst caves with multiple caves intersecting each other. Due to the scouring and dissolution of rapids for millions of years, the caves have steep cliffs and hanging stalactites, with various shapes and forms like supernatural works. Exploring it is like visiting the underwater dragon palace, art hall and mythological world.

Songbai Town is located in a beautiful and fertile valley basin. A small river originating from Jiulongchi flows quietly through the middle of the basin. There are two green mountains facing each other in the north and south, one like a lion and the other like an elephant, stretching for several miles, with their heads held high and their tails raised. People call this place Shixiangping. It is said that Emperor Yan Shennong once subdued a fiercely fighting lion and elephant here, and turned it into two mountains facing each other, hence the name.

Shennongjia Forest Area is a national AAAAA-level scenic spot. I really don’t know where to start introducing it because there are so many attractions.

Let's start with a rough classification:

1. Plants and animals: Golden monkeys (You can interact with golden monkeys at the Dalongtan scenic spot in Shennongding Scenic Area, but you need a separate ticket. You can see golden monkeys for free at Xiaolongtan in Shennongding Scenic Area, but you cannot interact), giant salamanders (you can see them for free in Guanmenshan Scenic Area), sika deer (you can see them at Dajiuhu National Wetland Park, and Guanmenshan will soon be open). The Millennium King of Cedars (Eight adults hug it, in Shennongtan) tourist area is rich in animal and plant resources, preserving a perfect subtropical forest ecosystem. There are 2,419 species of vascular plants in the area, 34 of which are under national key protection. There are 336 species of vertebrates, including 75 mammals, 308 birds, 23 amphibians, 40 reptiles, 47 fish, 67 species under national key protection, and more than 600 insects.

2. Scenic spot name: Tiansheng Bridge, Shennongtan, Guanmen Mountain, Shennongding, Dajiu Lake, International Ski Resort, Hongping Gallery, Rhino Cave, Yantian Scenic Area, Yantian Ski Resort. The above mentioned are the scenic spots of Shennongjia. There are many scenic spots in the scenic area, such as Guanmen Mountain has many botanical gardens and bee farms. Shennongding has Jinhouling, Da/Xiaolongtan, Shennongding, Shennong Valley, primitive forest, etc. Dajiu Lake has a sinkhole, etc.

3. When keeping bees, can feeding sugar water to the bee colony speed up the reproduction of bees?

Beekeeping, especially fixed-site beekeeping, does not allow for the honey sources around the bee farm to come one after another, and there will always be interruptions. When the honey flow is interrupted, in order to ensure the normal reproduction of the bee colony, the bee colony must be supplemented with feed. Generally, the bee colony does not lack pollen, and the usual practice is to feed some white sugar. During the spring breeding period of the bee colony, the outside world lacks honey and pollen, and it relies entirely on supplementary feed. Even if the reserved honey and pollen combs are very sufficient, in order to encourage the bee colony to improve its reproductive efficiency, the bee colony must still be rewarded with feeding to make the bee colony strong as soon as possible. Since the price of honey is high and the price of white sugar is low, most beekeepers still feed white sugar to the bee colony during the spring breeding period.

Since the emergence of ecological beekeeping, it is advocated to keep enough feed and not use artificial feed (probably referring to white sugar). In fact, it is difficult to not use artificial feed in actual beekeeping. It is possible to raise Chinese bees, but it is not realistic to raise Italian bees; leaving enough feed is known to all beekeepers and can basically be done.

Chinese bees are native bee species in my country, adapted to the local climate and nectar sources. Chinese bees have two major characteristics: one is that they can use sporadic nectar sources, and the other is that they can control the reproduction of bee colonies when the nectar flow of nectar sources changes. If the nectar flow of external nectar sources decreases, the queen bee's egg-laying speed slows down, the worker bees reduce the larvae breeding, save feed, achieve "balance of income and expenditure", and do not use the original stored honey, so there will be a certain amount of stored honey in the Chinese bee colony. However, raising Italian bees cannot do this. When sporadic nectar sources appear after the main nectar flow period, they do not know how to "tighten their belts". As long as the external climate is suitable, the queen bee will continue to produce (it will be less than when the nectar flow is large), the worker bees actively feed, consume a large amount of honey, and quickly use up the stored honey. If they are not supplemented, the consequences can be imagined. Due to various reasons, it is unlikely to supplement honey for the bee colony, and they can only be fed with white sugar, so it is difficult to raise Italian bees without sugar (except in places with particularly good nectar sources).

When new honey is collected from the outside world and brought into the hive, the bees are more motivated to work, the queen bee lays more eggs, and the colony grows rapidly. On the contrary, even if there is enough honey in the hive, the bees are not very motivated to work. In order to stimulate the bees to work hard, beekeepers have taken a measure: when the honey flow outside is poor or there is a lack of honey sources, if the bee colony has enough honey, feed the bee colony some thin syrup every day or every other day as reward feeding, which can stimulate the queen bee to lay more eggs and the worker bees to raise more larvae. Thus, the beekeeping term "reward feeding" appeared. Of course, white sugar is also used for reward feeding.

From the information, we know that the raw material used by bees to make honey, nectar, is mainly composed of sucrose. Sucrose is a disaccharide. After bees collect it, they add invertase to convert disaccharides into monosaccharides (glucose and fructose), expel excess water, and become honey. The main component of white sugar is also sucrose. After bees collect it, they can also convert it into glucose and fructose. People usually call it "molasses". The difference between molasses and honey is that molasses has no floral scent. Honey is the energy source of bees. People who have raised bees know that when there is a lack of nectar sources in the outside world, if sugar is not fed to the bee colony, the reproduction will be affected at the least, and the bees will collapse at the worst. Few people feed honey to the bee colony when the bee colony lacks honey, and almost all of them feed white sugar. Whoever feeds more white sugar will definitely raise good and strong bees. There is a catchphrase: "There is no trick to beekeeping, as long as sugar is fed." Although it is not completely correct, it also explains the role of feeding sugar. In the 1970s and 1980s, when the supply of white sugar was insufficient, some people fed syrup (Yitan, also called starch sugar), and they were able to breed, strengthen and grow the bee colony.

In the past, beekeeping books mentioned the term "artificial nectar source". The so-called artificial nectar source refers to the beekeeper feeding sugar water to the bees to create the illusion of honey flow and promote the reproduction of the bee colony. Perhaps because "feeding sugar is harmful to the health of bees" and contrary to the concept of "ecological beekeeping", no one mentioned it anymore. However, in actual beekeeping production, "artificial nectar sources" have always been used to breed bees (spring and autumn breeding). Some excellent beekeepers, such as Master Qiu Jiwei in Shangzhou, Zhejiang, use artificial nectar sources for beekeeping. He raises 95 bee colonies, feeds 420 starch sugar 14 tons and 16 bags of white sugar a year, and has high yields in fixed-site beekeeping. The annual gross income is 149,100 yuan, the average cost of feeding sugar per colony is 415 yuan, the total expenditure is 44,500 yuan, and the average net income per colony is 1,100 yuan. Despite this, for some reason, everyone is reluctant to admit this fact.

In foreign countries, when there is a lack of external nectar sources, bees also need to be fed sugar to maintain their normal work and life. Data shows that in a bee farm in Bulgaria, 2.7 tons of honey were produced in 1977 and 5.4 tons of sugar were fed. If the bee farm did not take the honey and left all the honey in the bee colony as feed, the bee colony would have stored 2.7 tons of honey. If the bee farm let the bees live on the stored honey of the bee colony and did not feed them sugar, I am afraid that the bees would have starved to death long ago.

We are only discussing the importance of feeding sugar to bees from the perspective of practical beekeeping. As for how to theoretically discuss the harmfulness of feeding sugar to bees, the author will not make any judgment.

There is no nectar source outside, for example in winter, the honey in the honeycomb has been eaten by the bees. If the cost of feeding honey is too high, feeding white sugar is the most economical.

If there is a nectar source outside but the weather is bad (rainy season), there will be no honey in the honeycomb. If the bees are not fed, they will die.

Honey bees are bred in spring, and the bee colony is very weak after wintering. Feeding white sugar will stimulate the queen bee to lay eggs and strengthen the bee colony before the arrival of large nectar sources.

If there is nectar from the outside or honey in the honeycomb, the breeders will not feed white sugar, because the white sugar fed is a disaccharide, which needs to be converted before it can be absorbed, and it has a great impact on the life span of the bees.

Bees love to eat honey. The main purpose of feeding them sugar water is to save honey. If we feed them sugar water, they will eat less honey, so we can get more honey.