Beekeeping as a Forest Industry

Summary

Although beekeeping is often classified as a branch of agriculture, beekeeping is a forest industry in regions which are not intensively cultivated and in forest areas, whether the beekeepers use primitive hives or modern commercial beekeeping techniques.

Some of the most valuable yielders of nectar and pollen are the forest trees, and the various shrubs and herbs of the forest and uncultivated areas. Thus the forests are of great importance as sources of food for bees, and through the industry of the bees, for mankind.

Most of the modern beekeeping equipment is made of timber, and the modern beekeeper is dependent upon the forests for his supplies, through the agency of the sawmiller and the bee appliance manufacturer. The primitive hive beekeeper obtains all his materials direct from the forest, and it costs him nothing but the labour of collecting the materials and converting them into hives. In the miombo woodland the trees killed by the beekeepers when collecting bark for hive making are large Julbernardia and Brachystegia. In view of the fact that the sawmillers in most of the miombo take mainly Pterocarpus the beekeepers may, in fact, be practising a useful form of silviculture by removing competitive trees of low timber value. The older trees which he kills may in any case have a lower nectar yield than the smaller ones he leaves.

Beekeeping can be combined with forestry or agriculture without requiring valuable land for its use. The nectar and pollen are produced by the trees, shrubs and herbs in any case, and the bees are used to collect these products from the flowers and convert them into honey and beeswax. Further, by pollination, the bees ensure the maximum production of fruit and seed, and materially increase the production of agricultural crops as well as the production of seed for the regeneration of the forest and the reclamation of eroded land. Thus beekeeping can play a valuable part in the multiple use of land.

The forests can be the source of greatly increased production of honey and beeswax if modern migratory beekeeping is practised. It is important that the forester should be familiar with the problems and needs of the modern apiarist whenever he appears, and should know the factors which have to be considered in selecting apiary sites, namely what is reasonable in the stocking of apiaries with hives, the distance the apiaries should be apart to prevent overstocking and restrict the spread of disease, and the techniques of apiary registration and the licensing of beekeepers in forest reserves. Finally, it is important for the forester to realize, in his concern to protect the forest from fire, that he has a valuable ally in the beekeeper.