> > or  plugging with excess pollen,

> This is something I haven't come across. Can you explain please?

In the 70s, in Northern Alberta, in the famous Peace River honey-producing 
area, the pollen was often so abundant, and the days so long, that bees we 
known to pack their brood combs to such an extent in the fall after brood 
ceased that beekeepers would pull pollen combs by the palletload and trade 
them straight across for empty combs from Southern Alberta where 
beekeepers had problems with pollen shortage.  Otherwise, they claimed, 
there was no place for the queen to lay.

Significant differences in pollen gathering tendancies have been 
identified in bees and the characteristic is one that can be selected 
fairly easily.

allen
http://www.honeybeeworld.com/diary/
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