Rapid 4 pint feeder

[Aggravated]

I have put on 3 of these feeders with sugar solution in, but the bees have ignored it completely. One of the colonies is a Nuc, and I would have thought they would be sucking it down, the other two colonies have a reasonable store of honey, I still need to move the supers down to below the brood boxes, but I think I will do this next week after the Apri guard has finished

Ideas or suggestions please

 

[joe9052]

I've had this problem before. Sugar solution doesn't smell, so they don't know it's there.
The way to let them know is when placing on hive, dribble a little down the entrance of the feeder onto the frames. You only need a couple drops. If you watch the bees, they will then start on the top of the frames, and follow the trail up into the feeder.

 

[REDWOOD]

If you have supers on it's along way for the bees to find it, place it directly on top of the feeder board and drizzle some syrup down the centre

 

[itma]

As others have said, you need to let them know it is there and where it is.
I use a Bay leaf (from a convenient tree) to 'paint' syrup around the cone (inside and out) before poking the recoated leaf right down the 'throat' of the feeder (so it sticks out below the feeder).
Signpost and ladder combined.

Keeping the feed warm definitely helps them take it faster.
Insulation above is simple. Insulation around the feeder is slightly more involved.

The underside of the feeder is badly designed (from the bees point of view).
The hole they need to go up is surrounded by a bigger 'ditch' (the hollow of the cone) that doesn't lead anywhere.
So I've made up some feeder boards with a (smallish) round hole that matches the size of the 'throat'. Thus the 'ditch' is masked off and there are no wrong turns offered to the bees. There's just one hole, go straight up. No possibility of getting side-tracked.
And because the alignment of hole and feeder is now more critical, mark round the feeder with a felt tip when it is lined up. Make it easy for yourself.


Oh, and with your suit on, you might try blowing gently down through the 'throat' of the feeder - often some curious or defensive bees will come up to see what is going on (and thereby discover the syrup).

 

[Davelin]

The underside of the feeder is badly designed (from the bees point of view).
The hole they need to go up is surrounded by a bigger 'ditch' (the hollow of the cone) that doesn't lead anywhere.

That's a very good point, and blindingly obvious when pointed out, making the crown board hole smaller seems very sensible.


Sorry Enrico: Feeder board!!

 

[For want of a better word]

If you add thymol to the syrup the bees find it.. never had a problem with any sub~species
Ligurian types seem to be the most greedy, even taking it down whilst (as now) the ivy flow is full on !

 

[charlievictorbravo]

If you add thymol to the syrup the bees find it.. never had a problem with any sub~species
Ligurian types seem to be the most greedy, even taking it down whilst (as now) the ivy flow is full on !

I started feeding two weeks ago because they were low on stores and there was no brood after the Thymol treatment. Sudden a few days ago, they started bringing in orange pollen (Michaelmas Daisy??), and, on inspection four days ago, I found eggs. I stopped feeding but left the feeder in place.

My thought was that while the bees could forage, I'd not add any syrup to the feeder but if the weather closes in for a few days, I could add some syrup for the girls to process.

Do you think this might be a wasted effort, belt and braces or good husbandry?

CVB

 

[Erichalfbee]

Ideas or suggestions please

A drop of lemongrass is my standard addition; works a treat
Itma's suggestion of narrowing the feed hole to match that of the feeder helps too.

 

[Nuc]

Over the last 3 winters (my entire beekeeping life) i have fed syrup with small 2 pint rapids, home made contact feeders, bought 1 gallon contact feeders and a home made ashforth feeder without any problems. This year i bought some 4 pint rapids of the type you commonly see for sale but found them useless. Tried all the tricks already mentioned including making the cb hole smaller, ladders, thymol and priming. Tried on various colonies of different sizes and strains of bee. The bees would invariably not go up the cone. Feeding with other types of feeder immediately had the bees feeding with gusto.
I thought i would share this as anyone with less experience or access to other feeders might assume the bees didn't need the syrup. My friend who also began at the same time as myself suffered a loss in his first winter because his bees wouldn't use this type of rapid. So beware.

 

[alanf]

I started with these 4 pint feeders, actually 2 litres since they're French. No real problems that I've seen if I dribble some syrup to start. Though as itma pointed out, on a porter slot the hole only lines up at 6 and 12 o'clock. There's a big ditch for most of the way round, but we are using a French feeder on a British National hole. Biggest problem I've found is taking off a feeder with syrup in, beware the bees lurking in the base that are a s*d to shake out.

 

[clv101]

I've had no problems at all using these 2L rapid feeders. They will take it all down within 2-3 days.