Thu 4 Feb 2010
Winter Pollen
Posted by Amanda under Food, General, Homesteading
[4] Comments
The flowers still aren’t in bloom but my bees are flying. And they are trucking in little loads of yellow pollen like they are leaving on a long trip to Europe. Their bags are stuffed. So I’ve been wondering, what are they eating? It is just barely February after all and I know we’ve had a mild Winter, but seriously!?
This sillouette of twigs are attached a tree, a very important bee-tree for early eating. Anyone guess what it is?
If you said, Maple, you are CORRECT!
(and you win nothing… sorry)
Now, I meant to do more with these maple trees than just let my bees feed off them. I meant to tap these babies in the Winter. But I missed the syrup train. I bought a little maple tapping kit from the people I get my bee stuff from (Bees ‘n Glass) because they have quite the sweet tooth. But I thought I still had time to tap in January. Apparently the sap was not flowing in January. It was flowing when we had that freeze in early December. So next year I’ll be more organized…
Big Leaf Maple tapping is a little different than tapping Sugar Maples back East. Sugar Maples are tapped in February or March. And their concentration of sugar in the sap is quite a lot higher. Big Leaf Maples have to bleed 44 litres of sap to produce 1 litre of syrup. When you start thinking about the legistics of this, it becomes clear that you cannot boil off the water in the sap to make syrup in your house. I do not want 43 litres of water humidifying my house! It became clear to me that we would have to do the evaporation process outside and over a long period of time. That was the part that I did not get as organized and it stalled me this year. But next year, I have high hopes.
I mean, what else is Winter for when you’re not beekeeping?
Apparently Big Leaf Maple syrup is like the stout of syrups. It’s quite a bit darker and stronger. But this is all hear-say. I haven’t tried any yet. Have you?
This weekend is the Big Leaf Maple Syrup festival in Duncan, BC. It is put on by the Vancouver Island Sapsuckers. (I know, the name makes me laugh too.) If you get a chance and are in the area, I recommend checking it out. It’s bound to be sweet. (Sorry, I couldn’t help myself.)
February 4th, 2010 at 11:27 am
Does that mean your bees are going to produce honey that tastes like maple syrup?
February 4th, 2010 at 11:56 am
Nope, but that’s a good question. Often it works like that. Bees collect nectar from blueberry plants, and the honey has a slight blueberry taste.
But with the maple trees, they are collecting pollen, not the nectar, so it doesn’t make the honey. Two different products.
February 5th, 2010 at 7:47 am
Do bees do different things with pollen and nectar? Does nectar make honey and pollen does something different?
February 5th, 2010 at 9:04 am
Yup. They do. Pollen is the protein that they feed to the brood (baby bees) because it is a complete protein with all 21 amino acids. Nectar makes the honey. They evaporate the flower-juice to make honey.