Influence of climatic factors and floristic diversity on the foraging activity of Apis mellifera adansonii Latreille in a West African Savannah

Abstract

AbstractThe foraging activities of pollinators depend on a variety of factors, such as the availability of pollen and nectar resources or the seasonality. We performed measurements on the activity patterns of Apis mellifera adansonii Latreille by focusing on different factors: (i) we counted the number of bees entering the hives during 10 min per hour starting from 05:00 AM to 06:00 PM, once a month and along the year, (ii) we measured the hive weights at different intervals during the study and (iii) we characterised the diversity of melliferous plants within a 1 km radius around the hives. Our results show that melliferous flora is composed of 83 species. During the dry season, the honey bees foraged on flowering trees and shrubs, whereas in the rainy season herbaceous plants provided forage for honey bees. The results revealed a significant correlation between foraging activity and the mean hive weights (r = 0.9) while relative humidity was negatively correlated but not significantly with, respectively, mean hive weights (r = −0.5) and foraging activity (r = −0.6). Thus, the combination of biotic and abiotic factors resulted in two distinct periods, namely a phase of honey flow followed by a phase of honey scarcity.