Food supply for apis mellifera bees in coffee in Pasuncha (Cundinamarca)

Abstract

For this study, the authors carried out the polynological analysis of the flowers found in a coffee plantation in Pasuncha (Cundinamarca). They collected the flowers from this habitat in order to extract the pollen, identify it and compare it with the bee bread collected in Apis mellifera hives. It was observed that
Apis visits the Cuphea racemosa in 60.1%, Bidens pilosa in 8.9%, Coffea arabica in 4.4%, Critonia morifolia in 3.8%, Gouania polígama in 3.4% Hedyosmum racemosum in 2.4%, and others in 17%. 

The researchers collected and classified five species which visited the coffee flowers during the first 2016 flowering period. Three out of them were identified: Apis mellifera, Paratrigonaeutaeniata and TrigonaAmalthea. Apis reaches its highest coffee pollen recollection between 8 am and noon.