Honey bee rearing is one of the very prosperous divisions of agriculture, but the stinging bees are a pain to the farmer while fetching the honey from the beehives. And now in a recent escalation, Scientists of Pesticides Department of Pantnagar Agricultural University have developed the technique to make the bee stingless, which is also known as Damar Bee.
Dr. Poonam Shrivastava, Assistant Director, Department of Scientific and Bee Reform Research and Training Center, said that Sting-less Bee (Teturagonola iridapenis) is also a social insect like Indian silence and Italian silence. In North India, it is found in all the states of Punjab, Haryana, Rajasthan, Maharashtra, Uttar Pradesh, Gujarat, Odisha, Uttarakhand and North Eastern and South India in the hollow of old trees and in the shell of the house walls.
Due to climate adaptability in South Indian states, it has been adhered to for the past several years. Although the production of honey by Damar bee is comparatively less than Italian and Indian silence, but the medicinal quality of the honey obtained from it has proved to be very high, due to which its value is also 8 to 10 times higher than normal honey.
He said that the technique of adhering to this species in the belt has been developed in northern India as a result of research done on the asphalt beekeeping in the university over the past several years. It was also hoped by them that the entire technology would be provided by the farmers for commercial adoption of asphalt beekeeping. Due to non-dumping, this species can be easily followed by women too.
Apart from honey, pollen and propolis can also be obtained from asphalt bees. This bee is also an important contributor to the production growth due to pollination in various crops such as sunflower, mustard, turmeric, litchi, mango, guava, coconut, koffee, pumpkin vegetables etc. Director Research Center, Dr. S. N. Tiwari said that by cultivating asymmetric bee keeping from technology developed by university scientists, the production of multi-purpose honey can be increased by farmers.
