Our Pine trees are in bloom now and boy oh boy how much pollen these cone flowers produce
This is pollen from only 4 small cone flowers and there is lots still inside of them!!! I mean so much pollen from Pine flowers I would have never thought is possible! Great for the bees indeed :) To be honest I did notice some very light powdery yellowish pollen on their legs and naively thought it was a paler than usual Canola pollen which is golden-greenish. I had no idea Pine produces so much of it :))
One local beek already had one hive swarm last week so I expected mine to do the same but nope. My ladies are waiting for something which is fine with me. Now its rainy but next week should be sunny and warm so thats the time to be ready. I have 2 hives boiling with bees. I have never seen so many bees in one single hive before! They must have 2 Queens in there!
Dandelion bloom is over but the Honeysuckle bushes and Hawthorn is in the bloom now.
p.s. for those of you who read my æast post about the farmer spraying pesticides; I did report the guy to the officials and they are onto him since as they say its illegal to spray Canola when in bloom during the bee fligh hours. Its onlt legal to do it between 21h evening -3h in the morning. This guy did it between 8-10h in the morning on a VERY sunny day, a big no no! They will call me back with results of their investigation, stay tuned.
So glad to hear that the officials are going to do something about the spraying! Good luck with that!
ReplyDeleteDo you notice bees on the pine? In Greece, bees make pine honey from aphids on the pine. But I've never seen bees getting pine pollen.
It's hard to see them on tall pine trees but I will observe them as soon we get sunny weather again. I'm sure they will not ignore such ample amount of pollen. Even in Scandinavia bees are known to collect honey dew from pine and spruce aphids. The honey is the cola color. Very dark. I like it but it crystallises in two weeks unless kept at 40'C or in a freezer.
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