Pollen feeding -- the upmost important thing

[Cindi]

Ann, you are a naughty girl, you haven't read my many posts on my pollen recipe, hee, hee, kidding.  I have posted my recipe several times, but I have absolutely no issue with copying it back into another post.  I should start a thread I guess, hee, hee.  I have altered the amount of pollen I use, it is more than double what the original recipe called for, and the patties hold together perfectly.   I am revamping the recipe again with the next batch that I make and I am going to double the pollen again, leaving the other ingredients as is.  Going to get as close to ALL pollen as I can, but still keeping the consistency so I can push the patty across the top of the bars above the brood nest.  This recipe came from our bee inspector for the Lower Mainland of British Columbia.  Have a wonderful and beautiful day, lovin' our life we live.  Cindi

This is a copy of my post I made in January, with some minor alterations in wording for clarity.

Original recipe by the bee inspector:
8 cups brewers' yeast
7 cups sugar
3 cups water
2 cups pollen

This is my new recipe that I changed from the one above, the only difference is the amount of brewers' yeast and pollen

Altered recipe
7 cups brewers' yeast
7 cups sugar
3 cups water
6 cups pollen

This concoction makes about 10, one pound (500 grams approx) patties.  These are very large, round and about 12 inches in diameter.  I place these round patties over the broodnest and I think it also helps to keep in warmth because of the size of them.  They last quite a long time.

The pollen has some of the water added to it, it is allowed to absorb and dissolve.  The remaining water is mixed with the sugar to make the thick sugar syrup.  It is necessary to dissolve pollen in the water because it does not dissolve so readily if sugar syrup is used for the liquid.

Then the pollen, sugar syrup mixture is added to the brewers' yeast and mixed up really really well.  This mixture will be very very hard to work with due to the thickness, but it must be mixed well.  When I make it I use my husbands drill with a painters paint mixing paddle attached.  I make it in a deep 12 gallon bucket.  This makes the work not so difficult.

The pollen mixture is laid on a piece of wax paper with another piece of wax paper on top and rolled or pushed reasonably flat.  I use a rolling pin.   It is then frozen or given to bees right away.  It can also be stored in fridge.  If it is frozen or in the fridge, it is imperative to warm it to room temperature or warmer before putting on the brood nest, if it is cold, it will chill the brood and that is really, really bad.

The wax paper is applied so that the pollen patty remains moist.  The bees will chew up the wax paper and either drop it to the bottom of the box or will pull it outside.

I feed the bees with this mixture of pollen patty and they love it to pieces.  I never find any wax paper debris in the hive either. The bees do do a good job of removing it.

I hope this has made all instructions as clear as can be.

[Understudy]

In SoFla and the rest of the state for that matter. We don't really need pollen patties. I remember attending one of Tillies local beekeeper meeting and askign about that in their area. They really didn't use them either because there was blooms year round. And they would be north of pdmattox.

I certainly can watch my bees bringing in pollen everyday.

For those in cooler climates they are probably essential in some form another to get through the season.

Sincerely,
Brendhan

[reinbeau]

Lazy, Cindi, I'm just plain lazy, I did search but got too many hits, so I asked -  :-P  I'm going to have to give this a try!  Thank you for saving my lazy butt.  :evil:

[KONASDAD]

This weekend I attended two  seminars for beeks. One was about bee viruses, the other pollen feeding fall and spring. The speaker was Heather Cattilda Ph.D from Canada, now at Cornell and did her research on feeding bees. Five year test. Turns out that fall feeding does not produce any benefit to spring build up or honey production. or hive surviving winter as well. When you fall feed, the onlt thing that occurs is winter bees are born later in the fall than w/ natural pollen availablilty. Their populations were identical in early spring regardless of whether pollen substitute or real pollen were given.(They used Bee pro.) All forms of pollen feeding in spring induces early build-up and therefore huge results in honey gathering. Conclusion from her, was its not economically worth it to feed fall pollen patties or substitutes, but very beneficial in spring. I asked her about vitogellin and the recent ABJ artcile. her response was that test didn't go far enough and she is planning to communicate w/ that author and continue her research. The other speaker was Dr. Judy Chen on bee viruses. I'll fill you guys in another post sometime as that too was fascinating

[annette]

In SoFla and the rest of the state for that matter. We don't really need pollen patties. I remember attending one of Tillies local beekeeper meeting and askign about that in their area. They really didn't use them either because there was blooms year round. And they would be north of pdmattox.

I certainly can watch my bees bringing in pollen everyday.

For those in cooler climates they are probably essential in some form another to get through the season.

Sincerely,
Brendhan

I am with you Brendhan,

Although I thought seriously about adding pollen patties, the bees are bringing in tons of pollen and when I got into one hive this weekend, I found many frames filled with pollen.
There doesn't seem to be a need here where I am.

Annette

[Cindi]

Brendhan, Annette.  Exactly!!!  It totally depends on the weather and the ability of the bees to GET OUT to gather pollen. 

I was looking outside today, the catkins on the hazelnut trees are LOADED with pollen, I am not kidding.  If the bees were able to get out, they would be loaded too.  But there is not a chance on this crazy earth that they can leave the hive, rain, rain and more rain in the forecast.  Pollen patty time.

Konasdad, how nice that you were able to attend these seminars.  Anything you learn that you can impart to us is a great thing, we all need more learnin'.  Have a wonderful and beautiful day, on this great earth.  Cindi