Pollen patty

Lifted the top feeder from the east hive, and gave the bees a pollen patty bought yesterday in Guelph. This is flat, about 1/2" thick, full width of the hive, and about half its length, so there's plenty of space for the bees to enter the chimney of the top feeder--which they seem not to have discovered. However, judging from how quickly they moved from their cluster to the pollen patty, that was gratefully received. NB--the pollen patty comes with paper top and bottom, and one paper has a grid of holes in it, about two inches apart. I decided to put the paper with holes on the bottom, and peeled the paper off the upper side of the patty, figuring that if the bees wanted no paper, they can take pollen from the top, and etc. etc.

Update

Opened both hives; took off winter covers. East hive seems okay, didn't move the frames to check, tho'; west hive caput. Put a top feeder on the east hive, filled with 3 liters of sugar syrup, and opened front entrance, scraped debris from bottom board and found some honey along with the winter-killed bees. Called bee-supply, pollen patties arrived this morning, ready for pickup at 1:30; going to Guelph this p.m. with friend and her dog for checkup at OVC, will pick up a couple.

It's spring!

It's spring, and we have a new pair of hive-top feeders, which the YBeek and I painted this afternoon, second coat tomorrow. The east hive was busily flying in the midday warmth day before yesterday; both hives show signs of cleansing flights. We bought 8kg of granulated sugar, and used half to make up 1:1 spring syrup.