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  • From: Randall Austin <ra41717 AT gmail.com>
  • To: Margaret Krome-Lukens <mskromelukens AT gmail.com>, ocba AT lists.ibiblio.org
  • Subject: Re: [ocba] nectar flow
  • Date: Tue, 07 Apr 2015 10:10:55 -0400

Margaret,

This is a fundamental question, but one that I couldn't get a straight answer to either when I started beekeeping! So here it is:

In our area, our main honey flow (the one that matters) is from tulip poplar trees. At my house, they start blooming on April 15th, or a couple of weeks earlier or later. Last year they didn't start until about May 1st. The year before that, it was closer to April 1st, if I remember correctly.

If you were to take all of the flowers from a single large tulip poplar tree and spread them on the ground, it would be equivalent to acres of ground plants. Each flower produces a teaspoon of nectar, so much that the trees can drip with nectar. Other plants bloom at the same time as tulip poplar (for example, blackberries), but the overwhelming volume comes from tulip poplar.

The NCSBA has a nice little plant blooming guide <here> that has rule-of-thumb bloom times for various plants. What the guide lacks is an indication of the volume of nectar from the plants, which will of course vary from area to area depending on the distribution of plants where you are.

Okay, that's all nice, but how do we know the flow has started at OUR house? There are 2 reliable signs:
  1. The first is obvious: the bees begin filling up empty cells with nectar. This can fire off quite rapidly when the bloom starts, so monitoring your hives often is important this time of year.
  2. The second sign is obvious for those who know about it: the bees will start creating new wax. You'll first see this new white wax on the rims of cells, as the bees get everything in order for storing the abundant nectar. When you see this, it is definitely time to add supers.
You'll know the flow has ended (some time in June) when the two signs above abruptly cease.

There is an article <here> that talks about some of these topics.

Your experience may vary depending on your location, management practices and who knows what, but the info above applies to most of us.

Randall


On 4/7/2015 8:11 AM, Margaret Krome-Lukens wrote:
Hello all,

Here's a very basic questions from a very beginner beekeeper!:

How do you know when nectar flow has started (or ended)?  Do you just go by general times of the year?  Or do you keep an eye on specific tree species?  I'm imagining that it must vary a bit year to year depending on the weather, right?

Thanks everyone!

Margaret


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