BEE ROBBERY
What is bee robbing?
The theft of honey from foreign hives..
When does bee robbing occur?
During the dearth period, which lasts from summer to November.
Why does bee robbing occur?
Bees are searching for food, and because it is the dearth period, they try to enter a foreign hive and steal food from another bee colony.
How does bee robbing occur?
Robber bees break through the guards, take the honey, and fly out of the hive.
When they return to their hive full of honey, they encourage the remaining bees in their hive to join them in the attack. Bee robbing begins.
What happens to the queen during bee robbing?
During a robbing attack, the robber bees first seek out the queen, whom they kill.
They kill her by stinging her or by clustering around her to suffocate her. When the queen dies, the colony becomes further weakened.
Who does the robbing?
The strongest bee colonies require the most food, so it is often bees from these colonies that initiate robbing.
Who gets robbed?
The suitable targets for attack are colonies without a queen, colonies with an old queen, colonies infected with varroa mites, or colonies that are numerically weaker. All these colonies are weak and lack strong defense.
How long does bee robbing last?
A few hours.
How do you recognize bee robbing?
- Bees relentlessly force their way into the hive through the entrance or cracks.
- Bees fight and sting each other.
- There are dead bees present on the ground.
- There is a buzzing noise inside the hive, similar to that during swarming.
- Bees are flying from the attacked hive back to their own hive, even at dusk.
How does a beekeeper prevent bee robbing?
- Bees need to have enough food.
- The hive must not have cracks and openings.
- During the dearth period, we don't inspect the bees, or we inspect them early in the morning and late in the evening.
- We feed the bees in the evening.
- Sugar solutions should not be spilled around the apiary.
- Empty frames are returned to the hive late in the evening.
- We have strong colonies that can defend themselves.
- We use a bee corridor to prevent bee robbing.
How does the corridor help guard bees defend the hive?
- In the event of a bee robbing attempt, the attacking bees are forced to go through a long corridor inserted into the hive entrance. Entering the hive through this long corridor confuses and disorients the attacking bees, allowing the guard bees to easily attack and drive them away in the corridor or at its exit.
- The strength of the attack by a large number of robbing bees is nullified in the narrow corridor, as they are forced to go through it in a single file, one after another.
- The corridor prevents the robbing bees from immediately dispersing throughout the hive. The guard bees have more time to prepare for defense, as the attackers must first pass through the long corridor one by one, emerging confused and disoriented among the prepared guard bees..
- The ceiling of the corridor has small holes, allowing the guard bees to immediately detect the entry of robbing bees into the corridor.
