Why is water important for bees or why do bees drink water?

Many beekeepers wonder if bees drink water and why they do it. Yes, bees drink water. But why is water important to bees? Let's see why bees need water at all, why do bees drink water? What time of the year do bees need water, what kind of water can be given to bees, is it possible to give salted water to bees, what proportions of water for bees with salt, how to teach bees to take water from a drinking bowl, what are the rules for apiary water supply, and many other questions important for a beekeeper practice will be covered in this article. Read to the end, it will be interesting.

Content

• Do bees need water and why
• What kind of water should be given to the bees?
• How to water the bees?
• Why salt water is needed for bees
• Salt water for bees proportions of water and salt
• How much water do bees need?
• How to water the bees?
• Can bees do without water?

 

 

Do bees need water and why?

Why do bees need water? Let's list all the possible options why bees need water:
The body of a bee contains a large amount of water in the muscles of bees 75-80 percent is water, and in the hemolymph of a bee more than 80% of water, so water is necessary for bees to keep their body normal. And they need water for this throughout the year. This is the first answer to the question why bees drink water.
Water is necessary for bees to feed the brood, or rather, to prepare food for them from a mixture of bee bread and honey. If there is not enough water for the bees during this period, then they throw out part of the brood from the cells. That's why bees need water, and especially why bees need water in the spring, when the bees are feeding a lot of brood.
Water for bees is necessary in order to dilute the honey to an acceptable concentration so that the bees themselves can eat. It is no secret that in the spring a beekeeper can look into the hive and see that the bees have died of starvation while they have sealed honey. The casket opens quite simply, it can be rapeseed or sunflower honey, which is very hard and the bees could eat it if they had water to dilute it to an acceptable consistency. But the bees could not get water in winter and therefore could not eat honey and died of starvation. Here is such a simple logical chain showing why bees need water in winter.
Bees need water to regulate the temperature and humidity in their nest. If the air temperature rises, the bees bring a large amount of water in order to place it around the brood part of the nest and reduce the temperature by evaporating water and increasing ventilation. To understand how important water is for bees during a hot period, it is enough to say that if the temperature is very high, then 90% of flying bees switch to collecting water. And this is another answer to the question whether bees need water in summer and why bees drink a lot of water in summer. And also a task for a beekeeper on a roaming how to provide bees with water.
This is how you can briefly answer why bees need water or why bees drink water.

 

 

What kind of water to give the bees?

There is a logical question what water to give to bees.
What water to water the bees is a rather interesting question, what is added to the water for the bees. As a rule, beekeepers give several types of water to bees.

• clean fresh water
• salted water
• water infused with needles.

How to water the bees?

 

For practicing beekeepers, a very important question is how to water the bees. In order to give water to the bees, beekeepers use bee drinkers.
The drinking bowl for bees is divided into two types, this is an intra-hive drinker for bees, as well as a general drinker for bees in the apiary.
It is extremely important to use both types of drinkers.
An in-hive bee drinker is important during periods of inclement weather and also in early spring to avoid losing large numbers of flying bees.
An intra-hive drinking bowl for bees is an extremely effective way to give bees water to drink in the summer in an area where contagious diseases of bees are present. Because common drinkers can become a source of infection for healthy colonies by transmitting infection from sick bees that also visit the drinker.
An intra-hive drinker for bees also contributes to a guaranteed supply of bees with clean water and therefore can be a prevention of a number of diseases, such as salmonellosis and a number of others.
If there is no source of clean water in the apiary, bees collect water from livestock farms, manure heaps, and so on. This can also be a source of antibiotics getting into the hive, first into the combs, and then into the honey. Which can also be a big surprise when selling honey.

If the apiary is healthy, then a common drinking bowl for bees is quite acceptable. One has only to accustom the bees to the water from this drinker.
A logical question arises, how to attract bees to a drinking bowl with water and how to accustom bees to water from this drinking bowl. You can attract bees to the drinker quite simply, in the first couple of days, pour sweetened water for the bees into the drinker. This will ensure that the bees find the drinker quickly. Subsequently, ordinary clean water can be poured into the drinking bowl, but the bees will still visit it.
How to supply water to bees? Water for bees in the apiary should be in the drinker by the first flight or by the time the bees are transferred to the point.
How to water the bees with water in summer? It is advisable to have two drinking bowls for bees at once in the apiary. Water for bees in the summer in one drinker will be filled with clean water, and the second drinker will be filled with salted water for bees.
How to give water to bees? Water for bees in the apiary should always be fresh, so you need to regularly update the water in the drinker.
How to pour water into the drinker for bees depends on the design of the drinker, their designs are so diverse that it is simply impossible to give any specific advice.

Why do bees need salt water?

 

In addition to clean fresh water, salted water is used for bees.
Why do bees need salt water, why do bees collect such water, because it would seem that they need fresh water. Bees need trace elements, for this reason, they collect not only fresh water, but also salted water containing various substances. The most important for bees are Cobalt iodine magnesium
Practical beekeepers note that if bees are given salted water, they stop collecting water on dunghills.

 

Salt water for bees proportions of water and salt

 

How much salt should be added to bee water? You can not pour salt into the water without measure, no one canceled salt toxicosis.
So, let's figure out how much salt to add to water for bees.

The effect of different salt concentrations on the lifespan of bees

As you can see, a rather favorable proportion of salt and water is 0.05%, that is, 5 g of salt per 10 liters of water.
How much salt to put bees in the water is understandable. What kind of salt should the bees put in the water? It is quite possible to use both ordinary table salt and iodized salt or sea salt.
Watering bees with salted water with the addition of iodine makes it possible to increase the resistance of bees to various diseases, especially protozoal ones.
Coniferous needles of pine or spruce can be added to plain water to make an infusion of needles, this will also increase the intake of vitamins and microelements to the bee family, along with water.
How to salt water for bees? Salting water for bees is quite simple, just pour 5 g of salt into a bucket of water and stir, after which pour the resulting salted water for bees into a drinking bowl.

 

How much water do bees need?

It is clear what water to give the bees, and how much water is needed. Depending on the strength of the bee family, bees need from 100 to 250 g of water per day. The average bee colony drinks 30 liters of water per season.
Of course, if the apiary is located in a hot climate, then the water consumption increases significantly, for example, in an apiary of 100 bee colonies, 50 liters of water are consumed on a hot day.
When do bee colonies drink water the most? Bees need water throughout the season, but bees need water most strongly in spring, in April-May, during the period of active colony growth.
Water for bees in the summer during hot weather, when it is necessary to cool the nest in the hive, is vital. And the hotter the hive gets, the more water they need.
Bees need water in smaller quantities in winter in order to dilute the honey, and also in order to start feeding the brood in February. As a rule, water is enough for bees in winter when the bees collect water, which in the form of condensate is in the form of drops on the side walls of the hive. Some beekeepers note that if instead of a canvas for the winter, leave a film with curved edges, it also condenses moisture well and the bees actively use this water to feed the brood.

How to water the bees?

In the spring, with the onset of warm days, the bees begin to fly out of the hive for water, by this time the drinking bowl for bees with water should already be in its place. It is important for bees that at this time the drinking bowl is protected from the wind and the water in it warms up well. In order for the water in the drinker to warm up, it is enough to put the drinker in a well-lit place and paint it black. Place for installation of drinking bowls for bees must be chosen so that it is convenient for the summer bees. Departures for water stop only if the temperature drops below 8 degrees Celsius. If there is no drinker for bees in the apiary, they can fly very far, which can cause the death of flying bees in adverse weather.
Also, the beekeeper should take measures to ensure that the bees do not drown in the drinker in the apiary. For this, different methods are used. For example, on the surface of the water in the drinker, you can place a wooden raft or expanded clay. Also used are drinkers of a design in which water constantly drips onto an inclined board so that a drop of water gradually flows down the chute and the bees can draw water.
It is also important to follow other simple rules on how to water the bees with water.
• Water for watering bees must be fresh and running, so periodically, if the bees do not drink all the water, the water must be poured out and recruited new.
• Periodically it is necessary to ensure the disinfection of the drinker, as well as the sloping board. To do this, it is enough to clean the drinker once a week from dirt, debris caused by the wind and disinfect it.
• Under no circumstances should mold or water bloom on the sloping board.

Can bees survive without water? 

No, bees cannot do without water, so there are often cases when bees die without water, and at different times of the year. A bee colony without water during hot weather can die if the bees cannot cool their nest for a long time to an acceptable level.
A bee colony can die without water in winter if the bees cannot dilute the honey with water.
A bee colony without water can slow down development, due to the fact that the bees cannot prepare food for the brood, and if there is no water for a long time, the colony will also die.