and the bee's have been hunkered down with temps running from low 20's to high 40's for 2 weeks or more. Today its calm and 59deg's so I just swung into one of my apiaries and as expected there was alot of activity. What really got me was they were bringing in massive loads of bright orange pollen and there was still many drones coming and going. Fall colors are long gone and snow will be here any day. I haven't a clue where they found pollen this late
we have not had more than on day in a month over 60 here and hardly any in the fifty's. It has froze several times. About two weeks ago we had one day that hit 60 and my buddy said his bees were bringing in pollen too. I wonder if they can still gather pollen off of dead flowers?
On days that reach 50 or so (may not hit that again for a while), my bees have also been bringing in pollen here in North Idaho as well. Definately a small harvest crew of only a handful of bees per minute. Interesting, because the leaves have mostly fallen and all gardens are long dead...I was wondering the same thing...where is it coming from?
My girls are bringing in pollen by the truck load...of course it was 92 here today :-D
Scott
There are trees, shrubs and plants that pollinate at different times of the year. a search in your favorite search engine for spring, fall and winter pollinating growth may bring up species in your area.
Danno,
Today I took the dogs for a walk in a field near my house and saw some goldenrod and asters still blooming. Considering the hard freezes we have had I was kinda surprised. Relatively speaking, you live in more of the banana belt of lower Michigan, so maybe more golden rod got spared from the frosts. :)
I saw a drone fly into a hive earlier this week. For some reason they are still needed. It was a hive that is a bit testy, so maybe they are superseding the old queen. Dunno, for sure.
Jay
American witchhazel and witchhazel may also be another possibility of pollen in Michigan. witchhazel blooms about now through December. of course the honey bee would need correct conditions as already stated.
here's something about American witchhazel http://plants.usda.gov/java/profile?symbol=HAVI4 If one follows through with the links inside, specifics are provided. Any plant species can be researched on http://plants.usda.gov/ just so long as it's in the database
list of plant species in Michigan
http://www.deq.state.mi.us/pw/
As long as I have the common name, I've looked up plants using plants.usda.gov quite a bit for my area.
YUp these warm days there pretty busy here.
I don't know much about asters, but they seem to start blooming around here when the goldenrod gets done, and continue blooming after the frost. I think they may still be going.
A few years back, we had a warm week in Jan. My bees were bringing back alot of an olive green pollen??. Our weather has been cooler, but still no killing frost and it is just minutes from Nov.
Jim