What's flowering as forage in your area

[Erichalfbee]

Thanks all that’s useful! The bottom 2 have a famous local landmark that locals will recognise, reinforcing the provenance (& price!) of the honey. Was thinking need a big sky for the description to stand out.

What's the landmark?
I asked Stan, a Yorkshireman, and he just shrugged his shoulders.

 

[tchu]

I’m confused now. I’m in Hertfordshire and someone from my teaching apiary said that it’s time to start feeding the bees but why should I if you’re all saying that there’s still foraging going on? Haven’t taken any supers off the hives that have supers on and haven’t started feeding the ones that this year never had supers on as they were split results and seem to still be building combs on foundation slowly but surely

 

[hemo]

Do your colonies have fresh nectar coming in, if so then no need to feed yet.
If not taking honey off and leaving it for the bees then you don't need to feed.
For feeding I wait until after treatments are finished (usually by mid Sept), as always one keeps an eye on stores levels so they don't go without. I will gauge stores properly from mid Sept onwards and decide if to give extra feed, in my area ivy usually is a good source of late forage and if mild till end of November.

 

[jenkinsbrynmair]

someone from my teaching apiary said that it’s time to start feeding the bees

Welcome to the world of BBKA. Everything done by numbers with no thought for what's actually happening with weather, season etc. The kind of people who will go out wearing an anorak in April even though we're in the middle of a spring heatwave.

 

[elainemary]

What's the landmark?
I asked Stan, a Yorkshireman, and he just shrugged his shoulders.

It's Studley Pike, near Hebden bridge & Todmorden. A monument to the Napoleonic wars

 

[tchu]

Do your colonies have fresh nectar coming in, if so then no need to feed yet.
If not taking honey off and leaving it for the bees then you don't need to feed.
For feeding I wait until after treatments are finished (usually by mid Sept), as always one keeps an eye on stores levels so they don't go without. I will gauge stores properly from mid Sept onwards and decide if to give extra feed, in my area ivy usually is a good source of late forage and if mild till end of November.

Thanks, Hemo; your input is always appreciated

 

[tchu]

Welcome to the world of BBKA. Everything done by numbers with no thought for what's actually happening with weather, season etc. The kind of people who will go out wearing an anorak in April even though we're in the middle of a spring heatwave.

Thank you; I see what you mean.

 

[hemo]

The advice to feed, feed & feed so early runs a high risk of leaving little space to rear the winter bees and in fact can & will lead to a summer swarm leaving in September or even later in August. One has to read the colony and gauge when to give feed and how much, proper winter feed doesn't need to start just yet it is really far too early to cramp the Queens style.
Each colony has to evaluated on a case by case situation rather then a one fits all policy.

 

[Murox]

Well, yesterday I removed a brood frame full of honey and put in a frame of foundation on a 14X12, not something I do routinely though. That hive certainly do not need feeding right now, they had 7 frames rammed with nectar/stores/honey with a minor flow still coming in, and they seem to have chucked out the drones over the last couple of weeks.

 

[CLB]

Our bees have taken to feeding on our lovely ripe plums, just like the wasps. There's plenty of garden flowers available, but yesterday they really wanted plum juice.

 

[jenkinsbrynmair]

No comment

 

[Curly green finger's]

The first one.

Three may look moody but one looks very summery and warm!

 

[pargyle]

Purple loostrife is looking stunning in the hedgerows, as always. Not sure if the ladies go for it. The bumles love it.

Fusia still has at least a month of flowering, even on a dull wet morning in today I saw a few bees working it

Purple loostrife around my pond is always covered in my bees and lots of other pollinators and insects of all sorts ... it spreads like mad so you have to watch it but it's a great bee plant when other species have largely stopped flowering - mine has been in bloom for three weeks or more and is still going strong.

 

[pargyle]

It's Studley Pike, near Hebden bridge & Todmorden. A monument to the Napoleonic wars

It's a really good uphill hike from Hebden Bridge ... done that a few times - would probably need my inhaler these days and more so with the heather in bloom !

 

[elainemary]

3 plants that the bees were active on today:
Purple Astilbe
Heleniums
Knapweed in the wildflower meadow

But above all, the bees were frantically heading out of the garden to the heather. Saw some interesting behaviour outside one hive, festoons of foragers returning to the hive forming webs of bees before collapsing due to the weight and then rushing inside the hive. Anyone seen this before or know what it’s all about?

 

[GuyNir]

3 plants that the bees were active on today:
Purple Astilbe
Heleniums
Knapweed in the wildflower meadow

But above all, the bees were frantically heading out of the garden to the heather. Saw some interesting behaviour outside one hive, festoons of foragers returning to the hive forming webs of bees before collapsing due to the weight and then rushing inside the hive. Anyone seen this before or know what it’s all about?

I could smell the heather in the apiary today. It‘s about a mile away…

 

[Badgergate]

It's Studley Pike, near Hebden bridge & Todmorden. A monument to the Napoleonic wars

Think it’s actually Stoodley Pike

 

[Jules59]

They've been busy on borage and mint his week

 

[GuyNir]

Heather and HB here, though I also seeing a fair bit of orange pollen coming in.

 

[Curly green finger's]

@elainemary could be the temperature your bees are flying a fair distance to the Heather from your garden? I've seen it with some of mine yesterday on the Clee the flow has started here but brood frames are getting full, only the odd super frames with fresh Nectar and partly capped frames in three days.
Lots of Heather pollen going into the hives though.