Feeding Pollen Patties, Part 2

I began feeding pollen patties" to my colonies near the middle of last of last month. I can already see a difference in the bee population more so than in previous years. Here is a picture of a colony about a month before I gave it a pollen patty.



Here is a picture of the same colony when the pollen patty was added. There are remnants of a sugar cake on the top bars if you were wondering.



I had to smoke the bees off of the top bars to get them off the tops so I could add the pollen patty.



I checked this colony about a month after adding the patty and discovered that the bees had consumed the patty and were dramatically building up the population. If you click on the picture you can see the bees packed in like sardines between the frames. The pollen patty is completely gone but you can still see what is left of the sugar cake on the top bars.



The bees are beginning to move into the upper deep as they are beginning to need more space. I am going to have to start making nucs from my stronger colonies really soon before they begin to feel the impulse to swarm.

The pictures of these frames of brood are pretty typical of most of my colonies now. These pictures were taken on March 14th. I had to shake some of the bees off to get a good look at the capped brood.



Here's a frame of brood before shaking any bees off. If you are wondering about the excessive burr comb on the bottom of the frames, that is what building your own bottom boards with a 1" rim will cause your bees to do.



The two frames pictured above are from a colony that I started last year with a daughter from the feral colony which was in the first few pictures. I started six colonies with feral daughters and they all overwintered well. The new colonies still need to build up. I gave them each a super of honey last fall before winter. When the population of the new colonies are strong enough I plan to take the supers, which should be full of brood, to start new colonies and a deep hive body back in it's place for the bees to build in. I have an aggressive plan for expanding my apiary in place this year and this why I am feeding the pollen patties.If I was not planning on expanding like I am I most likely would not be feeding the pollen patties. I have been adding additional vitamins, minerals, and amino acids to my pollen patties to help ensure the pollen patties contain the proper nutrition. If you would like to see some of the things that can be added to your pollen patties to make them more nutritional and beneficial to you bees visit MAAREC's website and read their article on Honey Bee Nutrition And Supplemental Feeding.

Since no pollen substitute is as good for bees as natural pollen I will not be giving them any more pollen patties this spring as they are bringing in large amounts of pollen. Pictured below is a frame with some bright yellow pollen the bees are bringing in. I am guessing they are getting this from the maple trees in the area as there are plenty of maples around. This is a frame from my weakest colony so you can imagine how much more the stronger colonies are bringing in.



Depending on your goals you may wish to implement feeding pollen patties as part of your beekeeping strategy. Just keep in mind that building up your bees before a good flow of nectar may also require you to feed you colonies syrup as an artificial nectar. I have read that it takes one frame of pollen and one frame of nectar to raise one frame of brood. If you fail to ensure your bees has the pollen or nectar you could cause them starve when stimulating them before a good nectar flow so be sure to monitor their progress early in the year.

Feeding Inside a Colony

During certain times of the year directly feeding a hive is beneficial to colonies development or survival. Depending on what you are trying to accomplish there are different ways to feed a colony inside of a hive and different things you may want to feed. You may want to feed pollen patties to your colonies to help build up the population or to supply a source of protein when there is no pollen available from foraging. You may find your colony light on stores during the winter and choose to feed granulated sugar. Medication may be administered through feeding syrup to a specific colony which needs it. Syrup is also used for brood rearing, wax production, and for building up winter stores. Though I am not feeding any medicine this post is about feeding invert sugar syrup to my colonies to help with brood rearing before the spring flow starts.

I have been feeding my bees communally for the past few weeks but have decided to place some syrup inside of my weaker hives. The stronger colonies have had an advantage over the smaller colonies with the communal feeding so by placing syrup inside the smaller colonies i hope to level the playing field. These colonies will no longer have to rely solely on the bees of foraging age to return from the field with syrup or nectar but now the house bees can gather syrup from within the hive and move it down to the brood where it is needed most. Another great advantage is that the bees can still continue to feed through inclement weather and during the night.

There are a few different types of inside feeders available commercially. There are a few different styles of hive top feeders, available but beekeepers do complain about bees drowning in them. The hive top feeders are convenient for the beekeeper because it holds a lot of syrup and is directly under the lid where it easy to refill. There is also a division board feeder but there are also complaints about bees drowning. This feeder holds less syrup than a hive top feeder and is more time consuming to access and use since it usually located in the brood chamber. Entrance feeders are really easy to use because you can see when they are empty. However with the syrup near the entrance it can induce robbing from other colonies. I have never experienced robing while using and entrance feeder and I do like to use them for the convenience factor. This time of year I prefer to use a double inside feeder.

To use the double inside feeder you need some extra hive bodies to place around the jars after they put on the inner lid. In the picture below you can see an empty hive atop each colony which will be getting a feeder.



You also need the double feeder. I made enough for every colony I have but only needed to use eight. The dimensions of the feeder is 12" long, 5 1/2" wide, and a 1/2" rim on the bottom. The 1/2 rim allows enough space for the bees to move freely under the feeder.



If you don't have any lids to go on the jars for the feeders they are easy to make. All you need is a 1 1/4" nail use to nail a top bar to the end bar when assembling a frame and a small block of wood. A soft piece of wood like pine will work best. Use the nail to poke holes in the canning lid while being careful not to drive the nail all the way through. You can make a few holes or more depending on how fast you want your bees to feed. The lids you can buy from the supply companies usually have sixteen holes.



After you get the hive bodies, double feeders, and syrup together it is time to put them to use. First remover the outer cover to expose the inner lid.



Then place the double inside feeder over the ventilation hole.



Then the jars go into the feeder. Be sure when that when you turn the jar over not to do it over the hive as syrup will stream out until the vacuum is created and keeps the syrup from coming out of the jar.



Then the empty hive body goes on to the inner lid to protect the jars.



After placing the outer lid in place it is best to use some weight to hold it and the empty hive down because the bees will not be able to access the cavity within to propolize them everything together.



In the picture below you can see the hives with the empty hive bodies in place over the inner lid.



I'm sorry about the poor quality of the pictures but it was near dusk and it was the best I could do at the time. I had spent most of the afternoon making syrup, painting hive bodies, cleaning jars, poking holes in lids, and making the double feeders so it was actually dark by the time I got finished with feeding the hives yesterday. Hopefully this has enlightened some of you about an inexpensive way to feed your colonies. The cost of the lids and bands for the canning jars were minimal and if you buy jars they will come with them. The wood I used to make the double inside feeders was some scrap lumber that I've had laying around garage that finally found a use. The jars are easy to use. All you need to do to refill the jars is just take a few jars out to your hives and replace the empty ones. I feel it much easier To use the inverted jars than it is to carry around a pail to refill a hive top feeder or division board feeder.

Strengthening a Weak Colony Part 3

I am still babying this colony. The queen is laying better and is laying a larger patch of brood than before. However the colony only has about three frames of bees and I feel it is near impossible for them to keep a double deep at the proper temperature to efficiently raise the amount of brood that they should be. So I am busting the two deeps down into a two story four frame nuc.

First I need to the nuc box into the position of where the full size double deep is. I begin by removing the upper deep which is still heavy and full of last year's honey. I like to place these heavy boxes on an empty super on the ground. It is easier on my than putting one of them atop an adjacent colony.



After removing the upper deep I got a good look to determine approximately how many bees were in the hive.



After seeing how few bees were in the hive I decided that they absolutely needed a smaller box. I had been wanting to put them into a nuc box for a while but finally had enough time last Sunday. I removed the lower brood chamber with the bottom board from the hive stand and placed the bottom board for the nuc in its place.



Then the deep nuc box went onto the nuc bottom board so I could begin transferring frames.



The first frames that I needed to locate were the ones which contained brood so the could be placed near the center of the nuc box.



The picture above is of brood from the small colony. You can see near the center of the brood patch where bees have been emerging. The queen is continuing to lay back into those empty cells to keep the brood concentrated together so the limited amount of nurse bees can take care of the brood more efficiently in a smaller area. Click on the picture to gen an enlarged picture to see the larvae in the center cells.

After locating two frames with brood they were put into the nuc box.



Next I found a frame with freshly gathered pollen which was located next to the brood frames.



This frame was put back into position in the nuc box as was a similar frame with pollen and nectar on the other side of the two brood frames.



I then added the second nuc box atop the first. I also placed the remnants of the pollen patty onto the top bars of the brood frames.



With the top nuc box in place I picked through the old upper deep to locate some nice frames with honey to put into the nuc. Since the bees will be able to maintain the cluster on the brood at the proper temperature more easily they will be able to raise more brood than they have. This means that they will need more food to feed the brood. I made sure to do my best to put four frames entirely filled with capped honey above the small cluster for easy access.





After filling the top nuc box with frames of honey I placed a migratory cover for a lid.



I have neglected putting this weak colony into a smaller box since I first began trying to save it. I do have more bees in it now. I also have the queen laying decently. She wasn't laying yet back when I first started working on the colony to save it about a month ago. I am sure the smaller area will help them out. They had way too much space in the full size equipment. Hopefully in another month from now that nuc will be packed with brood and bees. I gave the comb and honey I took from this weak colony to a couple of my fastest growing colonies. Hopefully I won't have to worry about the big colonies until I make some nucs from them. I also hope that I won't have to turn them into a nuc like I did this weak colony. As soon as I can requeen this colony it will be done.

Bait Hive

During this time of year your colonies may be making preparations to swarm. A lot of beekeepers implement certain management techniques to discourage their bees from swarming. One of these techniques is checkerboarding. Another method of swarm prevention is reversing the brood chambers. Both are methods used to expand the broodnest. Some people let their bees have an unlimited brood nest. This means they do not confine the queen to lay in certain boxes, usually with the help of a queen excluder, and gives her free reign to lay her eggs wherever she wants within the hive.
Bees swarm for different reasons. It is in the honeybees' nature to reproduce as it is the inborn instinct of any other living being. Honeybees reproduce by swarming to make new colonies. In reality, a colony of honeybees is a superorganism. Since so many individual organisms are required for the superorganism to live bees must swarm in mass to reproduce. If a colony of bees is not given enough space and outgrow their hive they will swarm due to overcrowding. A colony may also abscond from the hive but this should not be confused with swarming.
The problem with bees is that you may implement every known swarm control management technique known to man and still have a colony swarm. One of the easiest things to do is to make a nucleus colony from the one which is going to swarm or to split it. The easiest way to see that a colony is going to swarm is if the colony has capped swarm cells. These are typlically located near the bottom of the frames. I have also noticed in the past that a few days before a swarm emerges that some bees will mass on the outside of the hive facing down toward the entrance as if watching for the queen to come out and take flight with the exodus of bees which will make up the swarm.
Let's face it. We all lead such busy lives that it is impossible for some of us to check our colonies every week for capped swarm cells, sit and watch for a colony to swarm, or to even implement any swarm management. This is where a bait hive comes in really handy.
Though I am planning on making nucs from my colonies and continue to do so as they are strong enough up until mid July, it is quite possible that I may have a colony swarm and not be available to retrieve it before it disappears into the surrounding mountains. Therefore I am preparing a bait hive to use in case one of my colonies should swarm when I'm away.
For the bait hive I'm using an old nuc box I built a few years ago and only used to start out a few new colonies. If I should catch a swarm there is a rear chamber for holding an inverted jar of syrup for feeding until the population is large enough to move to a full sized deep. I am also using some drawn comb from a deadout I had this January.



The frames that I selected for the bait hive have drawn comb which brood has been raised in. The honey and pollen is not important to put into a bait hive as it will most likely be robbed out before any swarm moves in. However, the honey and pollen will definatley get the attention of any possible scout bees in the area.



All I did was to fill the five frame nuc with frames of brood comb. If you don't have much drawn comb on hand you can take a frame from the outer edge of the brood chamber from one of your colonies to use, Just replace it with a frame of foundation, a frame with a starter strip, or an empty frame. You can also put this frame between frames of of brood which can help to relieve congestion and overcrowding by opening up the brood area. This is a form of swarm prevention that some beekeepers use. If you just use one frame of brood comb for the bait hive you can use frames of foundation, frames with starter strips, or empty frames to fill the nuc.



Aside from the brood combs, there are other attractants used to lure the scout bees to the bait hive. Once scout bees find a new home for the swarm and agree on the location they will lead the swarm there. A good attractant to use is lemongrass oil.



It only takes a small amount of the lemongrass oil to use as a lure in your bait hive. A drop or two on each frame and a few drops at the entrance will last quite a while. A honeybee's olfactory senses are far superior to ours. They can smell the aroma of the oil long after we can't. Some people will use the oil evry week, some will every month, some will once a year. I perefer to use just a few drops every couple of weeks after the intial dose at the beginning of spring.

Ease of handling of your bait should be taken into consideration if you make your own. Some outer handles make it easy to carry. The entrance should also be somewhat smaller than on a regular full size hive.



A prime location for your bait hive is somewhere between ten to twelve feet off of the ground about fifty yards away from you colonies. You could even set up a perimeter of bait hives around your apiary. It is not of utmost importance to place your bait hive in such a manner. You could place it on the railing of your deck, on some masonry block a few yards from your hives, or almost anywhere you wish within reason.
If you don't have any brood comb or nuc boxes to use for a bait hive you can always use a swarm trap. Almost every beekeeping equipment supplier has these available for purchase. They also have swarm lure available as well.
I hope this helps you catch any swarms that you may have otherwise missed. I can't remember how many times I've came home in the vening to hear someone tell me I had a swarm and just point in the direction that they think it went. Sometimes I got lucky and had the swarm move into an old dead out or stay put on tree limb nearby. This year I am going to try to increase my odds of keeping any swarms that hopefully will not happen by using a few bait hives.

Building Up an Overwintered Nuc, Part 2

It had been a month since I last vivited the nuc that I am building up into a nice production unit for my daughter. I figured that after a month the queen would bee on the bigger frames in the deep nuc box and laying brood. After taking the outer and inner cover off of the nuc I then removed the empty deep nuc box which surrounded the feeders. The feeders were then taken off for my first look between the top bars to see if the bees had moved up as I had hoped.



Here's a good look down into the nuc. Please keep in mind that you can click on these pictures if you wish to enlarge them for a better view.



I know that just because there are bees near the top bars that it does not indicate that the cluster has mooved near there. So it was time to pull out a frame to inspect it for bees and brood. As I moved my hand over the nuc I could feel the heat rising from the small colony. The smaller sized small nuc boxes greatly benefit a colony's ability to thermoregulate itself. The first frame I pulled out was on the outer edge of the box.



Here's a slightly closer view of the same frame. Around the patch of capped brood is all stages of larvae, and eggs are on the very outer rings of the brood patch.



Since this was the first frame I pulled out I knew the next few frames would have brood as well. This is the next frame I took out of the nuc for inspection. If you look closely enough you can see the queen. You can see here near the open cells surrounded by capped brood on the left center of the frame. She was in the process of laying eggs back in the cells from which some new bees had just emerged.



Here are two more pictures of the queen, if you can find her.





After pulling a few of the frames I looked down into the nucs that the colony overwintered in that I put the pollen patty on when I added the first deep nuc box with frames. The small colony had eaten all of their pollen patty excepet a piece that was about one fourth of the original quantity I gave them. I didn't feel the need to pry into the lower two boxes to look for additional brood but I am confident there is some there. The pollen patties and syrup has really helped to build up this little nuc so far. You can see a piece of what was left of the pollen patty below.



After putting the frames back into place it was time to do what I had planned to do to this colony a month ago, and that was to add some more space. First I put the empty deep nuc box into place.



Then I began to insert deep frames of drawn comb into the empty box.



Then I inserted the rest of the frames. The deep frames of comb contain potions of honey, pollen, and some empty cells. I put the frames which were most empty to the center and the frames which had more honey and pollen to the outside. I believe the queen will be moving up to lay some eggs in those empty cells as it looked as if she was almost running out of space below.



Then the inner lid was put into place.



Finally, the outer cover was put into place.



The next time I go to this nuc it will be to put it into some full size equipment. I'm almost positive that I will be using eight frame equipment for this colony. The inside feeders are now at the entrance in an entrance feeder and the next time I visit the colony another pollen patty will be added. With as much early growth as this small nuc has already shown it is likely that I will be able to harvest a few supers of honey from it. I'll be sure to keep you posted.Thanks.

Communal Feeding

About two weeks ago I set up a feeder for my bees so they could have an easily accessible source of artificial nectar before the honey flow. This time of year the sugar syrup can trick the bees into thinking that they are having a honey flow and they will begin to raise more brood than they normally in order to catch up and have a large enough population to benefit from the nectar flow. This is a great way to get your bees to increase their population before the honey flow so you can benefit from it with a larger than normal honey harvest. This is also a great way to make the colonies strong enough to split or make nucs from a little earlier than you could otherwise. This is why I am feeding them stimulatively. Feeding pollen patties with the proper nutrients along with feeding sugar syrup for artificial nectar will increase the strength of your colonies and may cause some early swarms if you don't implement proper swarm prevention techniques. Another drawback is that putting the syrup out in the open can attract other insects or other people's bees. Your neighbor's bees may benefit more from the syrup if his colonies are stronger and have more foragers. I don't have any other beekeepers near me and if other bees feed here they are probably from a swarm which has escaped me in the past.

For communal feeding you can use High Fructose Corn Syrup (HFCS) or choose to make some invert sugar syrup. I made up 10 gallons of invert syrup and need to make more. The bees can go through a lot of syrup when they are raising brood. I decided to use five gallon buckets for feeders this year in an effort to avoid having to continually fill smaller inverted jars. However I will also be using jars to give an extra place for the bees to feed.



I added some spearmint oil, lemongrass oil, and some mineral salt to the syrup. These essential oils are reported to beneficial to the health of the honey bee. The salt is also something that is beneficial to the bees. I have read that the calcium helps the bees grow a stronger exoskeleton during the pupal stage of development. Mineral salt can easily bee found at hardware or feed stores in the form of a salt lick for cattle. I added about one pound of salt to the five gallon mixture and about 30 drops of each types of oil mentioned above. The mixture tasted good to me and the bees seem to enjoy it too.

After making the syrup I had to drill some holes in the lid. If you drill too many holes the bucket can not hold its vacuum to keep the syrup from leaking out. Through some trial and error I found that a lid with 24 holes worked rather well.



Here is a picture of a lid which had about twice as many holes. It acted more like a sieve than a feeder when the bucket was turned upside down. Something to consider when making your own bucket feeder is that you want to start with an airtight container. You can see the rubber gasket around the inside rim if the lid. It's a good thing I have a limitless supply of these old pickle buckets because I did go through a few lids until I made one that worked well.



After finally making a lid that worked well I need a way to suspend the bucket to allow a passage for the bees to access the feeder. I used 3/8" thick pieces of scrap wood and a piece of plywood roughly cut to the same shape of the lid. The plywood is 5/8" thick and gives the bees a space of about 3/8" to feed within.



When you flip the bucket some of the syrup will leak out until there is enough pressure to create the vacuum. The bees don't mind and will clean up what they can. Just be sure that the feeder does not leak or you could drown some of your bees.





I also used some entrance feeders to give the bees a few additional places to feed from. It wasn't the warmest of days when I put these feeders out but when it does get warm enough for some nice flying weather the bees really convene at the feeding station.



Having a close source of fresh water for your bees is also important. Your bees can become stressed and agitated easily when they don't have enough water or if they have to fly too far to obtain it. I have a creek that is constantly flowing nearby. Last summer it got really dry here during the drought so I used one of those plastic swimming pools for small children as a watering station. It's important to place some kind of object in the water that the bees can rest on while retrieving water for the colony. Here is a small scale example of bees collecting water from atop a bucket.



Communal feeding of dry pollen substitute or supplement is also easily done. Dry feeding pollen sub will stimulate your bees to forage for pollen. I dry feed pollen sub simply by placing a few pounds on the underside of a telescoping outer cover. It's like a big serving tray for the bees and makes it easy for you to take the tray indoors during inclement weather. I had some pictures of dry feeding pollen sub but I can not seem to locate them at this moment. When I find them I'll be sure to add them so you can get the full visual effect.