Is hawthorn a good source of pollen and nectar?

[alanf]

Lots of off white pollen coming in round here, seems likely to be hawthorn. There is a lot of it in flower along railways and around playing fields, although going off now in some cases.

 

[justme]

Farmers wife at one of my apiaries told me 2 weeks ago that the hawthorn outside her door had been plastered in my bees and bumbles. However, the ones at home are only just thinking about opening their buds - hawthorns, not bees:.)

 

[Swarm]

Seems this is a year that Hawthorn might yield, I was working beside one today with bees all over it.

 

[Davelin]

In a week my two hives have filled 3 supers between them and any available space in the brood box, now got 3 supers on each. Loads of hawthorn in the vicinity and the honey in the frames smells very much like hawthorn blossom so looks a good year for me at least.

 

[Black Comb]

What does Hawthorn nectar smell like?

 

[Davelin]

Well like hawthorn!
Quite a distinct smell, but impossible to describe, my recollection is that hawthorn honey is quite strong flavoured.
Only thing to do is to stick your nose in a hawthorn bush.

 

[aberreef]

I think my bees are working it, they put about 10lbs of weight on the supers since yesterday and I can't see what else they may be working. Not actually seen any on a hawthorn bush yet though

 

[busybeephilip]

Hawthorn Honey

Hathorn is a very poor nectar producer, there are plenty of rewf for this in the bee books. I too have never seen any sort of bees on this flower. Flowering period corresponds to that of chestnut and sycamore - this is where beekeepers think the white flower is the source of the spring flow.

 

[busybeephilip]

Also, beleive it or not, some beekeepers say they see honeybees on hawthorne. I was with someone on day who pointed this out, on closer examination the bush was covered in hover flies !

This is why we rarely see phots of bees on hawthorne

 

[Luminos]

Also, beleive it or not, some beekeepers say they see honeybees on hawthorne. I was with someone on day who pointed this out, on closer examination the bush was covered in hover flies !

This is why we rarely see phots of bees on hawthorne

I disagree. A few weeks ago my cultivated hawthorn "Paul's Scarlet" was covered in my bees

 

[bobandbec]

My bees have been working the hawthorn around them. The smell of hawthorn in the colonies is very strong. This is the first time they've worked it in about six or seven years around me.

Peter

 

[Jimmy]

Once again, FN Howes, formerly a botanist at Kew, and author of "Plants and Beekeeping" has loads of good stuff



It is available on-line for free but worth buying if you see a second hand copy. http://archive.org/details/plantsandbeekeep031830mbp

Paul

, managed to get hold of a copy based on this recommendation through ebay that was cheaper than amazon and I wanted a hard copy rather than a print out.
Much more detail than the section in Hooper's book although references to OSR etc are 30-odd years out of date.

 

[theworker]

I have just extracted two supers worth of a very dark, amberish honey which I am presuming is hawthorn (or whitethorn here in Ireland). I say its whitethorn as that all that was around the hives up until now and I was shown some by an older beekeeper a few years ago. Wonderful rich aroma, described best as nutty or almondy.

So it does yield honey and pollen except this is the first time I have got it in this apiary and I have had bees there for 10 years. The flow is supposed to be very dependent on a lot of interacting factors i.e soil temp, air temp, soil moisture etc.

 

[Erichalfbee]

You lucky thing....it sounds like Hawthorn which is supposed to yield nectar only rarely.
There has been masses out here and I have nearly three (uncapped....sigh) supers on one colony but I suspect it is sycamore.

 

[Goodwood]

Just taken 200lbs golden honey off 5 hives
Until the hawthorn started blossoming, there wasnt much there at all.
Btw, 30lbs from established colony on double brood in wooden hive.
The rest from four polyhives which were bought as nucs just 8weeks ago.
2 splits on the go too from one of the polys...

 

[Into the lions den]

62 years father and son we have never seen anything that we knew to be hawthorn honey, and never noticed a flow of any merit whatsoever from it. Yes the hives smell strongly of it right now, but its the pollen they are bringing back and possibly a nectar trace that has the smell.

Was asked to source hawthorn honey for a famous London dept store and got several offers of the best hawthorn honey from 'very proud of it' beekeepers. Sadly in each case it turned out to be sycamore. Got abuse for saying so.

Serious players have indicated to me that they HAVE managed on accasion to source small quantities of it, but his has invariably been from Ireland or the extreme west of the UK, the normally wet areas, at times when they get a freak heatwave immediately following a deluge. So, in keeping with a previous posters assertion, in the areas in question, yes, this could indeed be a hawthorn year. No for me it isnt, as always.

 

[PBee]

West of Ireland/Midlands had a very cold and mostly dry April and early May due to the winds being Easterly for a change. When the weather turned warm around 20th May we had a honey flow from Sycamore but only in apiaries which had been sheltered from the Easterly winds. Exposed sites started to yield from Sycamore around the 28th but the temperatures dropped and stopped the flow. Lots of pollen from Hawthorn but no honey as far as I could see. PB.

 

[susbees]

You lucky thing....it sounds like Hawthorn which is supposed to yield nectar only rarely.
There has been masses out here and I have nearly three (uncapped....sigh) supers on one colony but I suspect it is sycamore.

I agree...ours is more likely sycamore which they definitely worked mixed up with that OSR field a mile away which is going over now. Tonnes of hawthorn in flower. Bees not seen in the vicinity...