*Concerning Brian's questions on pollen trapping:*

* *

*1.*           *"I am not able to put the trap into bypass mode though as
drones get caught inside and we end up with a stinking mess of dead bees
inside the trap."*

*   Interesting.  I had not heard of that.  I run about 50 traps during the
summer and find that hives can be idiosyncratic to them.  For example, I use
screen bottom boards and on a few hives, I will find hundreds of drones
under the SBB but most will have none.*

*   My suggestion is that you 'try again' to use the front board to turn the
trap on and off.  When you push the board down to turn off collection do it
in mid-afternoon when all or most drones will be off flying.*

*2.*           *"**If I trap for 3 months or more (live in central Mn) honey
production drops and several hives end up queenless."*

*In my opinion, what is going on is that your hives are swarming or
superseding and the just-mated queens cannot get back into the hives.*

* *

*You have to watch for this.  When a beekeeper is collecting pollen daily,
she gets to 'expect' a certain amount from each hive.  When that suddenly
drops in half or lower, it is a sure sign of a swarm having left.  When I
see that, I immediately put the front board down to bypass collection.  In
several days, a virgin queen will leave for mating AND BE ABLE TO GET BACK
IN.  Two weeks after the bypass board has been put in place, check the brood
nest for eggs.  If they are there, start collecting pollen again.  If not,
check again in a week.*

* *

*3.*           *"Surprisingly though the "survivor" hives that have had
traps on them for 3 months or more appear to winter just as well as hives
with no pollen traps."*

* *

*Yep, that is the way it should be!*

* *

*4.*           *"I'm interested in how to measure the moisture content and
what is a good benchmark for dryness."*

* *

*If you rub fresh pollen between your thumb and forefinger, it will smudge.
Your pollen is dry enough (and not overly dry) if you can gently rub it
between thumb and forefinger and it stays in a ball without smudging.*

* *

*5.*           *"I never felt I had a good understanding of how pollen
trapping affects the colonies life cycle and nectar collecting activities."*

* *

*Read Tom Seeley's book The Wisdom of the Hive.  He describes the triggers
for pollen collection, how and why pollen is used by the bees, pollen
storage, and the conditions under which bees stop collecting pollen.  Briefly,
bees do not store wildly excessive amounts of pollen (as they do honey), but
instead only collect 'what they need plus a small amount of inventory'.*

* *

*I interpret this to mean that if we collect pollen it just triggers bees to
collect more and, since both pollen and nectar is collected on the same
trip, pollen collection has no detrimental effect on honey production.*

* *

*I think Brian asked many thoughtful questions, and I hope I have been
helpful.         *


--
Lloyd Spear
Owner Ross Rounds, Inc.
Manufacture of equipment for round comb honey sections,
Sundance Pollen Traps, and producer of Sundance custom labels.
Contact your dealer or www.RossRounds.com

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