تأثير بعض النكهات المصتعة على تغذية طوائف نحل العسل

Abstract EN

This study was conducted at the apiary of the Collage of Food and Agricultural Sciences, King Saud University Riyadh, Saudi Arabia on Honeybee colonies (Apis mellifera L.) The aim of this study was to evaluate the effect of some artificial essences on the consumption of artificial food provided to honeybees.

The essences of lemon and anise (aniseed) were used as feeding stimulants with sugar solutions and with pollen substitutes.

Also, some soft drinks were tested (namely Fanta) with citrus, orange, strawberry and apple flavors as feeding stimulants with pollen substitutes.

Results indicated that lemon essence at 3% caused significantly higher consumption than other treatments.

The attractiveness of anise essence was the least and could be considered as a repellent when compared to the control.

Also, the results indicated that the addition of artificial lemon essence at 3% to pollen substitutes gave the best results among all other treatments.

Addition of soft drink flavors (Fanta) to pollen substitutes had no effect on the food consumption of honeybee colonies.