Honeybee Production and Marketing Systems, Constraints - IPMS ...

4.2.7 Honeybees and their behaviors as described by farmersBased on their indigenous knowledge, beekeepers have their own methods of categorizing theirhoneybees, mostly based on the color of the honeybees. Sample respondents were asked todescribe local name of their honeybee colonies. They described the honeybees of their area as(47.7%) both Wanzie or Shimbrie (nearly yellow color) and Shanko (black color) types ofhoneybees while others have Wanzie (7.5%), Shanko (12.5%), Wanzie and mixed type (5.8%),Shanko and mixed type (6.7%), Wanzie, Shanko and mixed (20.8%) based on color. The race issimilar to A.m bandassii located on sub moist central highland of the region (Nuru, 2002).Beekeepers are also familiar with the physical appearance, productivity and temperament oflocal honeybees and reported that both yellow and dark colored varieties occur together in thesame colonies. This might be due to the fact that the queen may be mated with drones that comefrom different hives having varied colors.Sample respondents were also asked to describe preference of their honeybee colonies andmajority of them replied that they highly prefer shanko to other types (69.7%). Majority of therespondents (69.7%) characterized Shanko as more productive, tolerant to starvation and otherproblem and is hard worker than other types of honeybees with smaller body size. The degree ofpreference to Wanzie by beekeepers might be due to their assumption that this variety has gentlebehavior (Table 15).Table 15: Behavior of honeybee varieties based on beekeepers’ perceptionTotal sample (n=120)Shanko (%) Wanzie (%)Characteristics V. good Good Poor V. good Good PoorAggressiveness 65.5 24.5 10 21.3 49.1 29.6Productivity 50.0 37.3 12.7 24.5 36.4 39.1Swarming 45.0 38.5 16.5 37.4 40.2 22.4tendencyAbsconding 39.4 34.9 25.7 48.1 33.5 18.452