TECHNOLOGICAL ASPECTS OF BREEDING SOLITARY BEE <i>OSMIA RUFA </i>L
Osmia is an effective and prospective pollinator of Rosaceae family plants. This insect has a range of advantages, due to which it can be successfully bred on the industrial level. For the period of our multi-year research the certain experience of the breeding of Osmia has been accumulated. The main conditions of successful reproduction are the selection of the material and the size of the nesting channel. The paper presents the results of assessing the prospects for industrial breeding of a solitary bee Osmia rufa . Studies have shown that this species prefer to inhabit cane nesting channels (55 % of the population) with a diameter from 6 to 9 millimeters. The percentage of populating the channels of 6, 7, 8, 9 millimeters was 19.4%, 23.8 %, 18.2 % and 13.8 % respectively of all populated channels. According to the length of the channel, channels with a length of 100 to 200 mm were preferable, in which 64.8 % of all inhabited lengths were populated. The largest number of channels contained 3, 4, 5 cells - 14.6 %, 16.4 % and 14.4 % respectively. The studies of the content of the cells showed that 2671 cells with average length of 11,8 ± 0,94 millimeters have been built in 494 channels. 1960 cells contained whole cocoons (73.4 %), which is the absolute majority of all built cells. Parasites (flies Cacoxenus indagator, mites Chaetodactylus оsmiе, skin beetles Trichodes apiaries ) were contained in 206 cells and their total harmfulness was 7.7 %, dead Osmial larvae and damaged cocoons was noted in 262 cells (9.8 % of all cells built).