February has been a mixed bag really – we’ve had some really cold spells with snow, some windy days and finally some warmer weather towards the end of the month. We have done a couple of checks on the bees this month to make sure they are alive and well.

One job was to check the colonies had enough food on top and we did this first by hefting the hive and then lifting off the roof to take a peek at the fondant we had placed on during our last visit. It is always interesting to see how each colony varies in the amount they take. You can see in this photo that the bees were still up in this bag of fondant, feeding well from it.

This month we noticed that Thorne’s gardens seem to have a lot more crocuses this year than in previous years and the bees, despite it being fairly chilly, were very active collecting pollen from them! If you look closely, you may see a couple of bees on these beautiful crocuses. We were very happy to see this as it means that not only are they getting out and about, but it may also indicate that there is a need for extra pollen within the hive i.e., maybe the queens are starting to lay.

Therefore, as an additional boost, we also gave the bees the Api-Dry and Micro-Soja mix from Vetopharma to feed the bees some pollen substitute. We made up both the slushy and firm patties and placed them on the tops of the brood frames. Where we have double brooded colonies, we placed the patties in between the boxes to give the bees the best chance to access it. The added protein at this time of year going into spring will make sure they have pollen to feed on when they can’t get out to the crocuses. Here you can some of the firm patties made up and ready to go.

We have also experimented with the Api-dry and Micro-soja mix as a dry powder apiary feed. This is a popular way of feeding pollen substitute overseas and seems to be gaining momentum. It is not open wet feeding which uses syrup and can cause mayhem and robbing in the apiary. Powder pollen substitute is put out in a feeder that bees then come and collect from, much like a concentrated source of pollen found in a patch of flowers for example. This is especially useful during a pollen dearth or when robbing is a problem later in the season. From the research we have done, it appears that unlike with syrup, feeding powder pollen can actually prevent robbing as the bees continue to stay busy collecting pollen rather than fighting each other at their hive entrances. So, if it works, we may be able to add this feeding method to our repertoire. There are obviously pros and cons as with any type or method of feeding so we will give it a go see how we get on.

This may be our last few weeks of ‘quiet time’ until the autumn, so for now we continue to plan, organise and get things set up for the season ahead before the bees get busy and so do we!