For high-quality pollination, bee flowers must visit it from 4 to 30 times.

Lyubov Kosheva, a researcher at the NSC Institute of Beekeeping named after A.I. P. I. Prokofievich.

“Charles Darwin, when studying the advantages of cross-pollination and the dangers of long-term self-pollination, first emphasized that benign pollination is achieved only when bees and some other insects, collecting nectar and pollen, visit each flower repeatedly: from 8 to 30 or more.” the researcher notes. – This, according to him, significantly increases the likelihood of flowers receiving pollen from other flowers of the same species and leads to the enrichment of heredity, increasing the fertility and viability of plants.

Later, in 1967, an outstanding researcher in the field of beekeeping A. M. Melnichenko established the optimal multiplicity of pollination of flowers of honey plants by bees in order to establish the optimal number of bee colonies per 1 hectare of crops, where, taking into account the reliability index, he published the following coefficients: for buckwheat; mustard - 8-9; red clover - 4–5; phacelia - 11-12; cucumbers - 25-30.

She advises bringing bee families to honey plants in the first days of its flowering, because in this case the bees begin the process of pollination. If brought ahead of time, they will find other sources of honey collection and will be reluctant to switch to a particular culture. Finally, if the apiary is delivered with a delay, then the first best and largest flowers will remain undusted and the quality of pollination will decrease.

“Bee colonies should be placed in such a way that the bees can evenly cover the mass of the honey plant: in groups or along the perimeter, depending on the size and area of ​​​​the field,” says Lyubov Kosheva.

AgroTimes