Raspberry as a honey plant

 

Honey plant common raspberry - Rubus idaeus L.

The honey plant raspberry is bred in gardens and is found in the wild in almost all forests of Russia, Belarus, the Baltic states, Poland and other European countries. Raspberries are loved by bees and collect excellent honey from them. How good is raspberry as a honey plant, we will consider in this article. Read to the end - it will be interesting!

Content

• Raspberry honey plant
• Flowers of raspberry honey plant
• The benefits of raspberries for bees
• Raspberry honey productivity
• At what temperature do raspberries produce nectar?
• Pollination of raspberries
• Raspberry as pollen
• Raspberry honey

 

 

Raspberry honey plant

Raspberry honey plant grows well on loamy and sandy soils, in the south it is better on the northern slopes, and in the north on the southern slopes. Raspberries are usually bred by root offspring, planting them in well-prepared soil; in the south it is better in autumn, in the north in early spring.

Forest raspberry as a honey plant is found in many types of forests, but it can be found especially often in clearings and burnt areas, where, together with fireweed, it creates significant thickets, which are excellent honey lands. Especially often raspberry as a honey plant is found in forests in the northern regions of Russia, Siberia and the Far East. 

Raspberry honey plant flowers

 

What determines the good honey productivity of raspberries. First of all, the structure of the raspberry flower as a honey plant. The nectaries of raspberry flowers are a circle of glandular nectar-bearing tissue, which is located on the flower receptacle between the bunch of carpels and the surrounding 35 stamens. Therefore, when extracting nectar, the bees stick their proboscis to the receptacle between the stamens and the ovary and carry out cross-pollination of raspberries, although self-pollination also occurs easily in a number of varieties. However, in the case of pollination of raspberries by bees, the fruits are of higher quality, due to the fact that the raspberry fruit is a complex drupe, and therefore, in order for it to have a beautiful shape, it is necessary to fully pollinate the raspberries, which only bees can provide.

 

The benefits of raspberries for bees

How useful is raspberry for bees? Raspberry is a good honey plant, which gives bees the opportunity to collect nectar and pollen in large quantities.

What is the peculiarity of raspberry as a honey plant, why does the question arise whether raspberry is a honey plant?

 

Raspberry honey productivity

 

During the entire flowering period of the raspberry honey plant (as a rule, raspberries bloom in June), bees visit it very willingly, honey collection from raspberries continues from morning to evening, and sometimes continues even after sunset. It is indicated that bees continue to collect honey from raspberries even during light warm rains (raspberry flowers are tilted down and therefore somewhat protected from rain). 

Raspberry flowering stretches for a month or more, depending on the weather, while massive intensive flowering usually does not exceed two weeks. The timing of flowering forest raspberries. First of all, raspberry is like a honey plant, it is the forest raspberry that is useful, which grows in forests, and not on plantations. The raspberry honey plant in the forests blooms for a long time, which provides the bees with the opportunity for a good honey flow.

How many days do raspberries bear honey? It has been noticed that the farther to the north, the longer the duration of flowering of the forest raspberry. So, in the conditions of the forest-steppe, raspberry as a honey plant blooms for 2 weeks, the flowering time of forest raspberry in central Russia and Belarus is already stretched for a month, and in the northern forests, for example, the Vologda region, the flowering time of forest raspberry can last two months, which provides bees long and stable honey flow from raspberries.

For honey collection from raspberries, only mass flowering is important.

Do bees collect honey from raspberries? The work of the Research Institute of Beekeeping and its network showed that raspberry flowers produce so much nectar that a bee manages to choose it from only 3-5 flowers in one minute, while in other plants bees visit up to 30 flowers in a minute. The duration of flowering of one raspberry flower is 2 - 2.5 days. One raspberry flower during its life releases nectar - 4.1-5.6 mg. So raspberry honey plant is good. 

It was also found that raspberry honey productivity on average is about 100 kg (with fluctuations of 10-15 kg in either direction) and depends on the planting density of the raspberry melliferous plant, on weather conditions, and also on the variety.

Different varieties of raspberries react equally to adverse weather conditions, yet the honey productivity of raspberries of different varieties is different.

In orchards, the honey productivity of raspberries per hectare can reach 200 kg. Some sources claim that the honey productivity of forest raspberries can also reach 200 kg per hectare.

The control hive on the honey collection from raspberries can become heavier by 2.5-3 kg per day.

 

At what temperature do raspberries produce nectar?

At what temperature do raspberries produce nectar? It is believed that the maximum release of nectar by raspberries occurs at a temperature of 16 C. Drought has a negative effect on the release of nectar by raspberries, at high temperatures and low relative humidity, raspberry nectar dries up. Strong winds also do not contribute to the release of nectar by raspberries.

 

Raspberry pollination

Many nuances of raspberry pollination by bees are discussed in detail in the book How to conduct paid pollination of gardens and crops by honey bees.

 

  Features of pollination of raspberries by honey bees

 

Raspberry as pollen 

Raspberry flowers give the bees a lot of pollen, and the bees willingly collect it and carry light gray raspberries to the hive.

Pollen grains are trifurrow-orovye, spherical-flattened shape. The length of the polar axis is 20.4-22.5 µm, the equatorial diameter is 22.1-25.5 µm. In outline from the poles, they are rounded triangular, with slightly convex sides, and elliptical from the equator. Furrows 3.4-5.1 µm wide, with uneven edges, with unevenly pointed or unevenly blunt ends, not converging at the poles. Orae are rounded or longitudinally elongated, with a maximum diameter of up to 12 µm, somewhat wider than the furrows. Membrane of furrows and granular. Mesorium width 17-20 µm, apocolpium diameter 3.4-5.1 µm. The exine in the center of the mesorium is up to 2 µm thick, near the orb it is thinned to 0.5 µm and elevated; the rod layer is clearly visible; the covering and underlying layers are thin. The sculpture is thin, small tuberculate. The color of the pollen is light grey. So the raspberry honey plant is a good pollen-bearing plant. 

Raspberry honey 

Raspberry honey is collected in large quantities by bees, mainly from wild raspberries, the honey is of very good quality and is very popular due to its appearance and qualities.