Distribution

Japanese honeybee is a kind of eastern honeybee that lives in Japan Islands. Japanese honeybee is reported to live from Kyushu to Shimokita (North of Honshu), but not in Okinawa and Hokkaido.
Because western honeybee is widely bred to obtain honey since Meiji Era, Japanese honeybee had kept living in only mountain area. The way of keeping Japanese honeybee is simple and mostly depends on the condition of the nature.
We just take the swarm into a simple wooden box and don't take special care of it. When the swarm leaves the nest, we wait for a new swarm to come in. Japanese honeybee is often called "mountain honeybee", because they take honey from flowers that grow in natural fields. Japanese honeybee has lived for a long time in harmony with humans.

Change in enveronment

Recently, the environment in mountain in Japan has drastically changed. After cutting down the trees, new forests are artificial places, where Sugi or Hinoki trees are planted are growing. Since fewer people now live in mountain area because of the inconvenience, the population of Japanese honeybee is decreasing.
However, in urban area like Moriguchi (Osaka), population of Japanese Honeybee is unexpectedly increasing.
Since bees are often regarded as dangerous in city area, they are killed as harmful insects. But to tell the truth, strawberry in your garden needs the help of Japanese honeybee to bear fruits.

colony of atticlat (Moriguchi)

Reason for colony increase at the city

Why Japanese honeybee began to live in city area? Are there full of flowers in the city, which are rich in honey? No.
First, honeybee breeding is not a good business because low price honey is imported from foreign country. So the number of western honeybee, which is a competitor for Japanese honeybee to survive, is decreasing.
Second, fewer hornets live in the city area than in country side. If you find a nest of hornets, you should immediately ask a specialist to remove it, because hornets are very dangerous.
Third, for example, many crows live in the urban area in Tokyo. Someone said that crows live on the garbage from restaurants and houses. But this is not such a simple matter. Many people keep birds as pets, so they can't drive away crows by themselves. Or, some people just want to kill animals.
Japanese Honeybee may be the same case of the crows in Tokyo.

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