I have an old hive body out in the yard that I've been feeding pollen substitute from. I was adding to it this afternoon and thought I'd video a little before I put the top cover back in. They have probably taken 4 to 5 pounds so far. I have syrup jars out in the yard on nice days too. I don't keep them near the pollen sub,as I have seen bees get sticky from syrup then cover themselves in pollen dust. It does not do the bees good as the mess glues them up.
http://youtu.be/IfYVwa4B-Us (http://youtu.be/IfYVwa4B-Us)
Do you have any natural pollen coming in yet in PA? Ground still frozen in the shade here. I worry about open feeding and getting my bees out looking when nothing is there. That said, All mine have patties on and in a week some will have syrup.
I was thinking about this earlier this week. Would using an empty hive body encourage robbing? If this setup ever ran out would they move to the closest hive?
I don't think pollen will trigger robbing. Honey and sugar water will but not pollen.
Jim
I have the box of pollen substitute about 200 feet from my overwintered bees. We have a little bit of natural pollen coming in. This is a better source of protein than having them drag in sawdust and whatever else they may bring in. They are out looking anyhow,so it does no harm. I also have patties inside the hive,but they have not been very interested in those.
There is some natural pollen starting to come in as I can see different colors when they are at the hive entrance. On a plus side, if there are nay ferals out there,I sure would like them to build up too. :)
I've been using soy flour (no fat), for over fifty years, open feeding as in the video and never have seen any robbing resulting from it. Very good way of getting pollen to them IMO, maybe better than the patties. Was told that the small hive beetles go for the patties. OMTCW