EVALUATION OF THE PLACES FOR CREATION OF APIARIES AND OPTIMAL DISTRIBUTION OF THE BEE COLONIES

An approach for evaluation of the places for creation of apiaries and optimal distribution of bee colonies formed on the basis of the feeding capacities of the areas with flowering plants, the distances between these sites and the feeding areas is proposed. A multicriteria model with two main criteria is considered. The first maximizes the sum of the products of the weights for a given place multiplied by the number of colonies that will be positioned at that place. This criterion is divided into two sub-criteria, including the ‘subjective’ and ‘objective’ assessment of place preferences, respectively. The second criterion aims to minimize malnourished bee colonies. The model, with the proposed approach for ‘objective’ assessment of potential distribution sites, can be applied both for cases without overpopulation of the area with bee colonies and for areas with overpopulation.