Eucalypts and other honey bee forage plants -what you can do to help our honey bees

摘要

Arecent study undertaken by the South African National Biodiversity Institute (SANBI) revealed that gum trees, certain crops, indigenous trees and shrubs, flowering plants in suburban gardens and even roadside wildflowers or weeds are all critically important to South Africa's indigenous honey bees.Forage availability and accessibility for honey bees are a large constraint to beekeepers in South Africa, who manage colonies to harvest honey and provide a pollination service to growers of pollination-dependant crops. A lack of good quality and variety of forage can lead to unhealthy honey bee colonies that are more vulnerable to pests and diseases. This, in turn, can lead to insufficient pollination of our important agricultural crop flowers, leading to decreased yield or quality of the food crop.