Spring feeding

[ladaok]

most commercial keepers here in NZ spring feed sugar syrup and pollen patties
the idea is to stimulate hive growth by mimicking spring ...
what strength syrup do you feed ? some here just carry on with winter strength
2 sugar / 1 water others go 1 to 1 ....I think 1:1 mimics nectar flow best, as i'm pretty sure even the best nectar has a sugar content of around 40%

robbie

 

[madasafish]

I feed 1:1. As do other local keepers.
No need for pollen patties here. Lots of crocus/willow pollen and stored pollen.

 

[Finman]

I feed 1:1. As do other local keepers.
No need for pollen patties here. Lots of crocus/willow pollen and stored pollen.

That is that grandpa to son wisdom everywhere which has no fact basis.

95% beekeepers say that sugar feeding is usefull in spring, but only 5% says that buid up needs protein feeding.

100% of researchers say that build up needs pollen, because bees cannot pick pollen from plants. Why, spring weathers...


What guys use to do in different countries, it has not much to do with facts.

British beekeepers do their hobby tricks 10 times more than productive beekeepibg needs.
Christhmas evening meal is one example and Cristhmas lights on the roof.
Then listening with stetoscope, is the hive alive this morning.

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You want big hives and fast build up, but you do want double brood. What a mess.

Only double brood winterers has quick build up in spring.

Then destroying the build up in spring is popular: Splitting, killing brood, Demareering...




.

 

[jenkinsbrynmair]

I feed 1:1. As do other local keepers.
No need for pollen patties here. Lots of crocus/willow pollen and stored pollen.

no need for spring feeding period if you've fed the colony properly for the winter.

 

[Finman]

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By feeding in spring you only fill the valuable brooding area with sugar.
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First minimum factor in brooding is to keep brood area warm. I have seen it with terrarium heaters.

Night temps and windy rain weathers keep the hive cool.

And to add new boxes over the brood nest means often that bees cannot keep the broodnest warm, and they desrtroy even 30% of their recent brood. Larvae first.

Claim that you have allways pollen is not true. It is only a desire.

When you look your beehives brood combs, you see much holes in the capped brood surface.
It tells that bees have had lack of pollen and they have eaten part of larvae to get protein.

You write too out there that the laying queen keep "rest in summer laying". It tells that you have then serious short on pollen in nature and bees have cutted their brood rearing.

.

 

[charlievictorbravo]

In the UK, there are pollen-producing plants flowering for probably 10 months of the year - the two months where there is generally no pollen are in the middle of winter. Although pollen is available, the weather may not allow the bees out of the hive due to temperature, wind, rain, etc. to collect it and there is therefore a shortage of pollen for brooding. We've all seen perfectly good sources of pollen destroyed by wind and rain at all times of the year but when it happens in the spring it's almost bound to affect the start of brooding unless there are large stores of pollen in the hive.

In Australia, some of the plants that produce good nectar have little or unusable pollen so it is not uncommon for commercial beekeepers there to open feed pollen-based supplements to get the bees through the flowering periods of these plants.

I fed my 3 hives with small quantities of a pollen supplement that I made to Finman's recipe and I can report that it did not kill them. I'm not experienced enough to know how much good it did but swarming preparations were earlier than last year and it looks like I might get a honey crop this year but with only three hives and Cornish weather being so variable, my observations are not statistically significant in the general discussion about whether bees should be fed pollen or not in the spring.

CVB

 

[Stiffy]

most commercial keepers here in NZ spring feed sugar syrup and pollen patties
the idea is to stimulate hive growth by mimicking spring ...
what strength syrup do you feed ? some here just carry on with winter strength
2 sugar / 1 water others go 1 to 1 ....I think 1:1 mimics nectar flow best, as i'm pretty sure even the best nectar has a sugar content of around 40%

robbie

Never found any need to feed in spring and this year took off an amazing amount of honey early June.......needed to feed some early July; supposedly early summer which nearly caught me out.
S

 

[whynothot]

Then destroying the build up in spring is popular: Splitting, killing brood, Demareering...

.

Out of interest, what is wrong with demareering?

 

[Finman]

Out of interest, what is wrong with demareering?

You can spoil the hive build up with that.

It is better that you let the colony grow so long that it makes swarm cells.

But if you cannot sleep without it, it is then better to do.

 

[Finman]

Never found any need to feed in spring and this year took off an amazing amount of honey early June..
S

If I would get pollen, I would continue patty feeding. I have done it 26 years.
I gave realized now that pollen as health product is so expencive that irradiated pollen is difficult to get.

But like I said, 90% of beekeepers feel need to feed sugar to bees in spring even if it helps nothing.
.

 

[jenkinsbrynmair]

Out of interest, what is wrong with demareering?

Nothing - he just likes to speak rubbish when he doesn't have a clue what we're on about

 

[Finman]

Nothing - he just likes to speak rubbish when he doesn't have a clue what we're on about

I know exactly preventive demareering and its varations. Nothing difficult to understand. It is main prenventive swarm control system in Australia.


Jenkins, I have always kept you a smart guy, but you consentrate all your energy to insult other people.

I can tell you that beekeeping is not so difficult what you try to do it. To get 7 kg honey per hive makes everybody angry. And all historical names... Forget them, but it really makes your smart.


But in Finland beekeepers love to bark other beekeepers. We really are better village dogs than Welsh can ever do.
Every piece of work in beekeeping, you have out there a name and a deep 150 year history. Who cares. We do not much appreciate names in Finland. We just do beekeeping and extract honey. You would be here a mere piiping Chihuahua of roads.

 

[derekm]

..., but you consentrate all your energy to insult other people.
....

 

[jenkinsbrynmair]

you consentrate all your energy to insult other people.

No energy required whatsoever - you act as inspiration and make my job much easier

 

[Finman]

job much easier

Get a life. No idiot's life is easy.

.
.

 

[ladaok]

yes well ! I'm going to string feed and use substitute pollen patties.... we avoid using real pollen for the fear of spreading AFB
I,ve 22 hives to split once they are up and running late spring ...think what i'll do is start a new hive atop the original with a modified cloake or snelgrove board .... this way i'm hping the lower box will help the new queen on top build up quickly .... let's see what happens

 

[Finman]

this way i'm hping the lower box will help the new queen on top build up quickly .... let's see what happens

I do not know what you are doing, but I know how build up happends.

If you expand your apiary wrong way, you loose much of this year's yield.

After 54 beekeeping years I know very well what happens in my hives if I do this or that.

Critical point is that when hive has one box full of bees and brood, it will go by its own, but it is not able to get yield during next 2 months. And I mean that yield is over 50 kg/hive and not 10 kg/hive 10 kg is 4 full Langstroth frames. 50 kg is only 2 langstroth boxes.
.

 

[derekm]

....

100% of researchers say that build up needs pollen, because bees cannot pick pollen from plants. Why, spring weathers...
....

.

in the UK weather can deliver both -10 and +15 in February to April. And the bees that can, do collect pollen

 

[Finman]

in And the bees that can, do collect pollen

Our bees collect too, if they can. There 3 reasons why they do not can

1) There are no pollen in nature

2) Weather is such, that bees cannot fly.

3) Even they fly, they are not able to pack pollen into their legs.

 

[derekm]

Our bees collect too, if they can. There 3 reasons why they do not can

1) There are no pollen in nature

2) Weather is such, that bees cannot fly.

3) Even they fly, they are not able to pack pollen into their legs.

Then the bees I have seen doing it are hallocinations then?...