I was just thinking that even though the goldenrod is blooming, I sure don't see much new comb. I may slap a feeder on just to see what happens. If I do, should I use 2:1 at this point in the year, or is 1:1 still okay? Would you feed in this case? There's a full box of honey and pollen in the lower super, and probably half brood/food in the top.
Is anyone still feeding?
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Not, "still" feeding, but a dearth began near the end of June, so I've been feeding pollen substitute patties, to all hives and nucs, plus I'm feeding my queen cell builder colony 1:1 sugar syrup to help them grow nice, plump cells (they're starting to collect prickly pear fruit juice and it interferes with queen development). I never bother feeding 2:1, since most of the time the bees can use the extra water and we don't really have a "Winter" the bees have to deal with.
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I had bee packages installed end of april, i started feeding again with 2:1 sugar/water 2 days ago!
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I make my girls work. Next they'll want a wide screen TV(still only 19 inch to fit) and easy chairs. What do bees do without us.
Similar here near Albany. I fed 1:1 syrup to my new nucs for only about two weeks this Spring when they were first installed. Saw they were bringing in tons of pollen so I stopped feeding. After that haven't fed a thing and they are doing great. Saw plenty of pollen going into the hives this morning, and i see bees all over flowers everywhere I go. there is a lot of variety in our area- pastures and fields, woods, various small farm crops, berries, gardens...where i live it's not like the midwest where you see one crop for miles and miles around. Lots of variety on the bees buffet spread here.
I have been feeding one of my hives (I have 3) for about 2 weeks now. It was very slow to buildup this spring (didn't come through the winter well). I had requeened it in June, and it was building slowly, but with the dearth they weren't drawing comb, so I started feeding. I fed again last Friday, and there was a lot more bees in the hive, so a new hatch must have come out since I checked them previously, and they were drawing comb nicely. The other 2 seem to be doing alright - one is a "boomer" of a hive from last year and the other was a package that I started in April. So far, so good - I'm learning more every day.
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I've heard that too, but I don't get it. Why would they ever stop taking it? It sure is easier than foraging.
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Why? Who knows. Maybe they're just smarter than we are, have a better work ethic and place a higher value on quality than on ease?
Or perhaps I anthropomorphize a bit.
Wayne
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bet you are right tho
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I feed through the summer to the ones that need it, nucs, etc. Good time for my bees to draw out frames for storage.
I haven't started feeding yet either. I am thinking about starting pollen patties next month. The bees seem to be keeping up plenty of honey stores and I have about 3 gallons of honey and a full meduim super of capped comb in the freezer for feeding this winter..
I just restarted feeding my hive..Its a new package and I wanted to make sure they had enough reserves to get them through the winter. I used a 1:1 syrup in a home made quart size plastic wonton soup container. Not sure the holes in the container are big enough as the syrup hasn't moved. How much of a drip do you want? When the holes were first poked there were beads of syrup, now they seemed to have sealed themselves up. Any pros giving advice on homemade containers would be welcome.
Ma-Honey
Ma-Honey
You don't want anything to drip out. They can get it without any beading up from the holes.
I started three hives this past spring. They all took off with the nectar flow, but now it's so hot and dry in Georgia I don't think they're finding anything. One hive looks desperate with lots of empty comb and low population. Another has a larger population but isn't building. The strongest hive may be holding its own but is not growing. I started feeding (one to one) last week, but the largest two hives will take about as much as I'll give them, and quickly, too. With the cost of sugar, I really can't afford to give them as much as they will take. If you're feeding this summer, how much are you giving them?
Floral nectars likely contains a wider diversity of chemicals and sugars that aren't found in sugar syrup. Nectar is almost certainly a higher quality food for bees - making the foraging effort worth it.
Also, it is likely that bees 'stop taking' syrup when there is a flow on not because they don't want the syrup too, but because all available foragers are occupied foraging outside of the hive. We just perceive this as rejecting the syrup. That says a lot about their preference for natural plant sugars as well as the difference between overwintering on honey vs. overwintering on syrup! Bees survive on both, but bees are healthier when they have the honey to feed on.
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