Abstract:
The study was conducted in Fogera District south Gonder zone, Amhara region, Ethiopia to
evaluate the Performance of different hive types and determination of biological requirements
of local honeybees. Data were collected from 95 beekeepers having bee colonies from
highland and midland agro-ecologies. Primery data was collected from sample beekeepers
with semi-structured questioner by a single visitor multiple subject formal survey methods. All
collected data were analyzed using SPSS v - 20 and SAS IPM V- 9 software, micro soft excel
and one way ANOVA method using the General Linear Model (GLM) procedure and further
more independent sample t- test to compere mean. The study indicates that based on their
level of education (47.37%) of the respondent were illiterate and about 40% of the beekeepers
involved in beekeeping for 11 -20 years which indicates had its own indigenous knowledge.
For 66.31% of the beekeepers swarm cacthing was the source of a honeybee colony to start
beekeeping. 87.5% and 80.85% of the respondent beekeepers have stated that the shanko
/black/ type bee is very aggressive in highland and midland regions respectively. 6.25% and
12.77% of the beekeepers in the highland and midland representations have explained that
this bee is less productive than the wanzie type bee. Swarming incidence was higher in a
traditional beehive that ccunted (89.58%) and (95.74%) in highland and midland agro
ecology respectively. Absconding incidence was also higher that accunted 87.5% and 80.85%
in the highland and midland agro ecologies respectively. Moreover, pest incidence, miss use
of agrochemicals, lack of shelter, prevalence of honeybee diseases, lack of bee forage and
drought have been identified as the major causes of colony absconding. Majority of the
respondents were states that in highland region March - May was high rate of colony
absconding observed whereas, in midland representations June - August. 30.5 % of the
respondents were tried to feed supplementary feed during dearth period but the remaining
69.5% cannot be practiced supplementary feeds. On the other hand, colony strength was
higher in the transitional beehive than all other types of beehives in both highland and
midland agro ecologies. The average honey yield in the past four years from (2015 – 2018)
has been confirmed that there was decreasing trend. About 97.2% of the respondents in
highland area were harvest their honey in (major season) October to December whereas, in
midland representation (95.75%) of the respondents were harvest their honey from March