Honey as A Regional Bee Floral Indicator: A palynological assessment Tidke J. A.*, Nagarkar S. S.** Laboratory of Reproductive Biology of Angiosperms, Department of Botany, Sant Gadge Baba Amravati University, Amravati, 444 602, Maharashtra, India *E-mail: jaikirantidke@rediffmail.com
** ssnagarkar@rediffmail.com
Online published on 25 April, 2016. Abstract Honey is one of the important biotic natural resources and an excellent food supplement. Honey bees not only enhance the production of agricultural and horticultural crops but also play an important role in maintaining ecosystem, biodiversity and conservation. Apiculture industry can be managed with very little expenditure as it utilizes natural resources, which is an eco-friendly profitable rural industry providing employment to the rural and tribal people. Pollen spectra of the regional honey samples varied according to the vegetation type utilized by the bees within the floristically diverse regions. Analysis of pollen contents of honey samples provide reliable information of floral resources of honeys along with relative preferences of the bees among the diverse assemblages of plant species flowering synchronously. Bee flora of the region provides information about the pollen and nectar sources and its availability during flowering period. For the present investigation honey samples were collected for the analysis of pollen for defining seasonal and locational changes in bee pasture components of the vegetation in Amravati district at Maharashtra during the period August 2006 to April 2009, covering a total 30 honey samples. Two samples were found to be unifloral and twenty eight honey samples were multifloral. Further, two predominant and twenty one secondary pollen types were recorded. The pollen spectra indicated that the bee flora in Amravati district includes both naturalised as well as crop plants. The investigation revealed that in addition to already known bee forage (e.g. Brassica, Coriandrum, Moringa, Terminalia and Bombax ceiba) some other species including Eucalyptus, Syzygium and Pongamia that were planted for social forestry programs, were also heavily utilized as pollen and nectar sources by honey bees from this region. The agricultural crops like Helianthus annuus, Allium cepa and Cajanus cajan were also found to be very useful food resources for honey bees. Top Keywords Bee flora, honey, palynology, plant indicator, Amravati. Catalase, Peroxidase. Top |