Beekeeping

By Kristen Townsend, M.S.

Honey bees were first domesticated for use of their “natural sweetener” and for beeswax by the ancient Egyptians, estimated to a time before 2600 BCE (vanEngelsdorp, 2009). Some of these beginning stages of honey bee domestication and management are actually documented by paintings on Mesolithic rocks in South Africa, India and Spain (Seeley, 1985). This practice was passed on to the ancient Greeks by 650 BCE and then to the Romans by 150 BCE, who facilitated the dispersal of this knowledge throughout medieval northern Europe. As European beekeepers shared both the art of beekeeping as well as the bees themselves, this practice developed worldwide. From the initial exploitative phases of hunting wild honey bee hives to claiming ownership over wild beehives to present day apiculture including, constructing and maintaining containers for colonies of bees, humans and bees have a long history of interaction for the larger distribution of bee products.

In addition to honey production, bees provide a significant contribution to modern agriculture through pollination, as almost half of the 115 leading global food commodities rely on honeybee pollination for reproduction. As reported by Klein et al; honey bees “remain the most economically valuable pollinators of crop monocultures worldwide…and yields of some fruit, see and nut crops decrease by more than 90% without these pollinators” (Klein et al, 2007).

More info about Bee Connection’s work with beekeepers coming soon! Stay tuned!

References

Klein AM, Vaissière BE, Cane JH, Steffan-Dewenter I, Cunningham SA, Kremen C, Tscharntke T. 2007. Importance of pollinators in changing landscapes for world crops. Proceedings of the Royal Society: Biological Sciences 274: 303-313.

Seeley T. 1985. Honeybee Ecology: A Study of Adaptation in Social Life. New Jersey: Princeton University Press.

vanEngelsdorp D, Evans JD, Saegerman C, Mullin C, Haubruge E, Nguyen BK, Frazier M, Frazier J, Cox-Foster D, Chen Y, Underwood R, Tarpy DR, Pettis JS. 2009. Colony Collapse Disorder: A Descriptive Study. PLoS ONE 4(8): e6481.