What the bees are buzzing about.

Just when the first blueberries come into bloom the bees find other plants more exciting.

June blueberry - full bloom

Patriot blueberry - full bloom

 

The dandelions are going to seed but the oak is alive with bees.

dandelion

Oak blossoms

Wild apples abound in the area and fruit trees are in bloom.

wild apple

Transparent apple

 

Honeybees will move to where the foraging is easiest but Bumblebees have a less varied taste. They tend to stick with the blueberries.

 

                                                                                                                      

Abundant pollen

Hardy Hibiscus is an example of a plant whose flowers produce lots of pollen. Lately the bees have been coming to the hive with a yellow pollen from a source that is so prolific that bees spill their load when they brush up against the entrance or other bees. The bee in the picture below was so loaded she landed below the hive entrance landing. It’s easy to see how such a big load of pollen can be easily dislodged.

load of pollen

Anise Hyssop, on the other hand, produces so little pollen it’s hard to get a picture of a bee with any pollen at all. In the picture below you can see the small grey pollen load on the bee as it forages in the Anise Hyssop.

Anise Hyssop pollen

Applebees

Apple blossoms are preferred by bees over blueberry blossoms. In Pitt Meadows B.C. there are many wild apple trees in wooded or unkept areas. This is quite a challenge to the blueberry grower who wants to get his blueberries pollinated but finds his bees spending all their time in the apple blossoms.

The wild apple trees produce a fruit that is elongated but hardly more than a centimeter in length. Birds do the Johnney Appleseed thing so that wild apples are planted far and wide. In the two pictures below bees are collecting pollen and nector from wild apples. (click on photo to enlarge).

                                    

Over thirty years ago known apple varieties were grafted onto the wild apple stock. The wild apple root system was well adapted to the land so this was a winning combination. The next two pictures show a Transparent apple with it’s smooth bark grafted onto wild apple stock. Notice the rough bark of the wild apple and the suckers trying to grow from the wild apple trunk. These, of course, would produce wild apples.

                           

The third picture clearly shows the graft of a wonderful cooking apple onto wild apple stock. There is a sucker growing up from the roots with the typical sharp spikes of the wild apple. 

Foraging sources for honeybees #2

We are moving to the end of the foraging season to feature the main plant source for honeybees and bumblebees. Anise hyssop (licorice mint) is a plant that we feel can do the job to satisfy the bees over a long period of time from late July right through the fall.

  Anise Hyssop is useful both in flower and herb gardens. Its aromatic properties were known to the North American Indians, who used the leaves as a cough medicine. It has also been a popular bee plant, yielding a fine, mildly anise-tasting honey. [It is] easily grown and make dense, leafy borders and hedges. The flower spikes can be cut for summer bouquets and dried for winter arrangements. The fresh green leaves are decorative in salads and floating on drinks and summery bowls. I start [hyssop] in the greenhouse in the beginning of May and plant them out a month later. Flowering starts even in unfavorable summers in late July and continues until late autumn. The plants self-seed in the garden and usually overwinter well.  Source:http://www.culinarycafe.com/Flowers/Anise_Hyssop.html

        click on image to enlarge

 Last year’s anise hyssop shows up in the spring well before the last frost. Seeds scaterred from last year have germinated and are starting to grow around the parent plant (first picture). It’s easy to collect seed and start new plants indoors (second picture). Both of these methods allow for very quick expansion of your anise hyssop patch.

                                

   

Foraging sources for honeybees

This is a chronological list of the food sources for honeybees. Some occur naturally in the area and some have been added to supplement the bee’s diet. Hazelnut catkins appear in February and sometimes extend into March. Given the combination of a warm day for the bees to fly and ripe pollen on the catkins and the bees can make use of this source. Because of the time of year it is hit and miss but this was a good year for the bees to be all over the hazelnut. It is an abundant source but not of the best quality. Pussy willows can be variable depending on the bush. Some put out their pollen early and some can be up to a month later! We are fortunate to have early and late willows here. Early rhododendrons are favored by the bees but one night of frost can kill the blooms.

Left-Hazelnut catkins  Right-Pussywillow  Below-Rosamundi rhodo

                                    

                        

April 11,08. The bees are bringing in lots of pollen. There is a sugar syrup pail in each hive. This stimulus should lead to lots of egg laying in anticipation of the main blueberry pollination which is 3-4 weeks away.

   click on image to enlarge

 As the picture indicates, there is abundant pollen at this time. It’s hard to see the catkins at the top of the birches but the weather channel reports that the pollen count for birch is high so birch is suspect. The bees are all over the Skimmia at the nursery next door and some Dandelion pollen is coming in.

Blueberry growers are always warned that dandelions are competitors for blueberries because bees prefer dandelion. I have found that dandelions peak before and after the main blueberry bloom and then there is another beneficial peak in the fall.

April 16, 2008. Several plum trees are in full bloom and the broad leaf maples have just blossomed so there is lots to keep the bees going until the blueberries are ready. A few early June blueberries have blossoms.

 Foraging sources for honeybee will be continued in a new post.

Bees that rob flowers

When bees cannot reach to the base of a flower to collect nectar with their tongue they will cut through at the base of the flower to “rob” nectar. A bee doing this is not pollinating the flower. Here is a picture of a bumblebee taking nectar from the base of a long tubular flower.  Source:http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Bumblebee

For a blueberry grower the hardest variety to pollinate is Bluecrop. Bluecrop is not a natural preference for bees and so it takes more hives per acre to achieve the same pollination as other varieties. Also, Bluecrop has a long tubular flower that tempts bees to chew through at the base and “rob” the nectar. Italian bees, popular with beekeepers, have a short tongue and are inclined to chew through at the flower base to reach the nectar. Carniolan bees have a longer tongue so they are not a problem. This is where Mason bees can be a help to get the pollination done.

           

  Carniolan bee            Italian bee           pollinating

Mason bees emerge in the Spring several weeks before the Bluecrop are ready for pollination.  In fact, Mason bees pollinate Bluecrop close to the end of their life cycle. The next post will look at how the Mason bees are kept alive while waiting for the Bluecrop flowers to bloom.