Thimble Berries and Salmon Berries

    Both thimble berries and salmon berries are in the Rubus family and are thus cousins of the raspberries.  We have a lot of salmon berries in western Washington and a lesser amount of thimble berries. While there are a lot of salmon berries in my neighborhood,  I've never seen my bees pay much attention to them. Neither have I noticed large quantities of nectar coming into the hives when the salmon berries are in bloom. This is something I certainly would notice as the salmon berries bloom at a time when I am always feeding my bees lots of sugar syrup.

Thimble berry blossoms

     I wasn't aware of any significant patches of thimble berries in my neighborhood until recently.  This past week I noticed a patch of big white blossoms a little more than a quarter mile from my house.  The thimbleberries really stood out because the surrounding blackberries weren't blooming yet.  Then the following day I found another thimble berry patch about a quarter mile to the north,  The first time I only noticed bumble bees working the blossoms but the temperature was only 52 degrees.  Today I looked at the thimble berries when it was 72 degrees and again I only saw bumble bees working the blossoms.  That may be the reason thimble berries didn't make it into the plant section in Honey Plants of North America.  I would expect my bees to find any plant within a half mile that was a good nectar source.

     Thimble berries actually have a pretty good flavor, but an unfortunate mealy texture.  I've often thought they would make a wonderful jelly, but its hard to find a sufficient quantity in one place to make it worth the trouble to gather them. If anyone ever gives me a gift of thimble berry jelly I will know they put an awful lot of work into the gift.

Feeding the Bees

   Over the course of a week at the Beez Neez Apiary Supply Quentin and I spend a fair amount of time on the phone answering the questions of beginning beekeepers.  This past week (the first week of June) the most common question pertained to why their bees seemed sluggish and were clustered at the entrance of the hive.  This is actually a pretty easy problem to diagnosis. Our response was usually something along the line of, "When did you stop feeding your bees?"  In western Washington most rural beekeepers experience a serious nectar dearth following the bloom of the Big Leaf Maple trees in late April and early May.  This dearth or lack of nectar sources usually continues until the Himalaya Blackberries start to bloom.  This can vary from mid June until early July, depending on the weather of a given year and the exact location of the bees.  The Puget Sound area has lots of different micro climates.  This is further complicated by the fact that some urban beekeepers benefit from some good nectar sources among their neighborhood landscape plants. However, this time of year can be pretty slim pickings for most rural beehives.

   My advice is to never assume that you can stop feeding your bees based on some arbitrary date on the calendar.  There is no substitute for looking in the hive and thus ensuring that your bees have an adequate food supply stored in their combs.  You cannot rely on someone else's experience with their hives as they  are usually not in your same location.  Their hives may indeed have adequate stores sufficient to last them through to the start of the blackberry nectar flow.  Their hives may well have benefited from nectar sources your hives did not have.   The safe thing to do is to just plan on continuing to feed the bees until you notice that they have either stopped taking the syrup or you can see that they have accumulated significant stores of nectar.  Even if you are able to stop feeding for a time, the food supplies of your colonies will still need to be closely monitored until the blackberries start to bloom.  Assessing a colony's food stores is one of those things you are supposed to be doing whenever you open up a beehive and look at the frames.

    If you find yourself in the awkward position of having a colony on the verge of starvation, you may need to sprinkle a little sugar syrup directly on the bees. If they are sluggish due to starvation, they may be too far gone to access the feeder. Oftentimes a light misting with sugar syrup will help them regain their vigor more quickly.

    I think many beekeepers have had the unfortunate experience of having a hive or two starve out in the late spring. I know that I have.  As a consequence I suffered a fair amount of guilt and barely managed to get through the experience without going to counseling.  Ever since then I have been much more careful in monitoring the food supplies of my colonies in the spring.

Humble Bumbles

   I was looking at my blueberries early this morning to see if we had good fruit set when I noticed several  bumble bees, each just hanging onto a blossom.  Apparently they had been working late, were stranded by the rain or cold, and had spent the night clinging to a blossom.  I suppose it is also possible they had been stranded by an early morning rain storm.  When I took this photo there were other bumblebees busily working the blueberry blossoms.  I really have to admire the grit of the bumble bees.  They start really early in the morning and they work until its almost black dark. I wish we had honeybees that were so well adapted to our cool maritime climate.  The beehive in the background of the photo is my modified Warre hive.  I took a photo of the entrance of the Warre hive just after taking this photo and there was no activity at all.

Note the bumble bee in the center of the photo

Modified Warre Hive with no activity at the entrance 

    We have a huge rhododendron tree in our front yard.  I say tree because it is larger than some semi-dwarf fruit trees.  In late May and early June its covered with lavender pink blossoms and it is alive with bumble bees. With all of the bumble bees working the blossoms the plant is much louder than my little apiary of 10 honeybee hives. That buzz is already going strong when I go outside at 6:00 a.m. and continues past dusk. Bumble bees certainly can't be accused of working banker's hours. I've often watched the bumble bees working the blossoms, but I have only noticed a honeybee on the rhododendron once.  I'm assuming the structure of the flower or the nectaries is probably such that the honeybees have difficulty working the blossoms.

     It looks like our himalaya blackberries are getting close to blooming.  That is probably a consequence of our relatively warm weather in May.  I think we had close to ten seventy degree days scattered throughout the month.  I've lived in Snohomish since 1993 and I can't recall ever having seen that much warm weather in May.  I pay very close attention to the 70 degree mark as that is the magic point at which it is warm enough for queens to take mating flights. Now that we're into June the weather patterns seem to be more normal. Normal spring weather for us consists of highs in the mid to low sixties with a fair amount of rain showers, chance of showers, and chance of rain.  Now I'm concerned that the blackberries will bloom several weeks before the weather will be warm enough for a good nectar flow. Himalaya blackberries seem to be very temperature sensitive where nectar production is concerned.  At seventy and sunny they produce nectar profusely, At lower temperatures they seem to be a non-event for the bees.

Himalaya Blackberries on the verge of the bloom

Evergreen Blackberry with its deeply cut leaves.
Note the Himalaya blackberry leaves in the center of the photo.