How To Make Pollen Patties – BeePro Pollen Substitute Recipe for Stronger Bees

Hi, I'm Laurence Edwards from Black Mountain Honey. Welcome to another episode of No Nonsense Beekeeping. Today we're going to be taking a look at how to make bee pollen substitute patties. So I'm using a pollen substitute today called BeePro. This is available from Bee Equipment UK, which is effectively Man Lake in the US. They do 2 different types of bee pollen substitute in these 50-pound sacks. They do Bee Pro and they do an Ultra Bee. Now, I normally use Ultra Bee, but they haven't got any in stock at the moment and my bees urgently need some pollen patties, so I've gone with the Bee Pro this time round, but there's not much difference between them. I find I've used this a couple of times in the past and the bees take it down just as well as the Ultra Bee, so the choice is really up to you. So in the previous video, I showed you how to make 2:1 sugar syrup. Now we're going to use that sugar syrup that's in this oil drum here We're going to put that into the buckets, we're going to put the BeePro pollen substitute in, and then we're going to mix it up with a paddle drill to get it into the consistency that we use to make up these patties. The patties are excellent for early spring build-up, so I've tested that a few times now, kind of over the years, and I've definitely found that when I use them, the colonies come into the season a lot stronger. That's because there's a lot more available protein within the hive That the bees can access too, so you get early brood rearing. It comes with risks though, so if you are doing it at the incorrect time of year or you do it too early and then you get a cold snap, the potential brood that's been created due to the additional protein that's in the hive can get abandoned and you can set the bees back. So timing is critical. The other issue with it is if there's already plenty of pollen already in your hive, then you won't see any additional benefit through doing this. So So you need to kind of have a look really in your hives early in the season, check and see how much protein pollen frames are available in there. If you're having unusual amount of losses, which I am this year, that can be down to the amount of protein that's within the hive. So there's various factors you need to look at. So like I say, in this video, I'm just going to show you how to make that protein patties and the formula that I use and just kind of give you a bit of a video how-to guide how to make these patties. You can use any kind of size bucket for this, just make sure that you can kind of carry it. So what you want to do is you want to fill it up to a certain level with 2:1 sugar syrup. I've got these buckets kind of— I know roughly where I need to go in terms of filling them up, so I'm going to fill them up from the oil drum and then I'll add the pollen substitute in. And you're looking for a very particular texture, which I'll show you in the video. So we've added the sugar syrup in. I go for about a quarter of the bucket of 2:1 sugar syrup. Then we take some standard kind of maize oilseed rape vegetable oil, but basically any 100% pure vegetable oil. Give it a splash of that. The reason that you use the oil is that it stops the patties drying out. That's quite critical, you don't want your patties to kind of dry out. This mixture really firms up overnight, so you want to leave it slightly sloppy, slightly viscous, put the lid on it, and then the next day it's really firm, kind of like sponges up like a cake. If you leave it exposed to air, it really does harden up. So within the hive, once you sandwich it between the greaseproof paper, the air can still interact and it hardens it, makes it a lot more difficult for the bees to access and to digest. So the oil in the mix helps it, helps it, stops it hardening up, keeps it nice and soft. So once you've done it a few times, you can kind of, you know, how to do it just by eye. Like, the formula is, I mean, I'll put the recipe up, you can see exactly what the components are. All it is is Bee Pro pollen substitute, 2:1 sugar syrup, and oil. Some people have a recipe that states the, the weight of the water as well, but I don't do it that way. I just use 2:1 syrup. B-Pro or Ultra B substitute, a bit of oil, and then I mix it up and I know the kind of consistency that I'm looking for. So I'll get in there now and give it a stir, and if we need to top it up, we can do that. So as in the previous video where I made the sugar syrup, this is what I use to mix it up. Real time saver, this is a paddle mixer from Screwfix. Pick them up for about £60-70. This is all it ever gets used for, so I mean, this is dedicated to kind of sugar syrup and B-sub. That's all I use it for. So I turn the setting down on this one. So it's got variable speed settings. For the sugar syrup, it goes on the highest setting. For this one, I start off on the lowest setting and then kind of build it up. And again, still a little bit too dry, so I'm going to add some more sugar syrup. The beauty of doing it this way around is that I know that I'm always going to get the end mix right because I know that's 2:1 sugar syrup, which is what I want. That never changes. So the consistency is constant. The constituents in there are always the same. I just top it up with a little bit of oil, and I kind of just use like a bit of a feel to make sure I'm getting the right amount in there. But I know once I get that consistency that I'm looking for, and I'll show you on here, I know I've got the components pretty much spot on. So that's it. Um, you want that wobble on it like that. It's hard work doing it. I mean, I've got about 5 different buckets of this to do. You want it on the wet side. This is what I always got caught out with before. You kind of look at the videos online and you see the finished product where they're applying it into the hive. This really stiffens up overnight, so you want it overly wet now. The next day when you come to use it, it's a lot stiffer, so just kind of beware of that. I've bought a new kind of long-handled stainless steel garden trowel. I use this for cleaning out honey buckets. Such a good piece of kit. I had a smaller one before, but the long-handled one which I just bought, really, really useful. Um, so you can use it with this as well. And that's the kind of consistency that you're looking at. Like, you can see it's very, very wet. If you were to put that in the hive now, and lay it over the top bars, it would just all fall down through them. But you'll see this later on in the video. You'll see what it's like tomorrow morning. It's considerably thicker. It'll still have a bit of movement to it, it'll still be squidgy, and you'll be able to kind of move it between the layers of greaseproof paper, but it's considerably stiffer than it is now. So don't get caught out into mixing it to the consistency that you think is right. Follow the recipe and you should come out with exactly this. So I'll post the recipe up there that I use. It is Michael Palmer's recipe, like he kind of knows exactly what to do with pollen sub, so I haven't changed anything. I've just used his recipe and it's absolutely spot on, so thanks Mike for that recipe. So yeah, I'll continue mixing up the rest of them and then we'll talk further about how I'm going to use it. Right, so that's pretty much it, and it's an absolute godsend, the hammer drill. Like, I've done this a couple of years mixing Pollen Sub by hand with a stick, and it's hard work with a hammer drill, let alone doing it with a stick. So I would very much recommend investing in the paddle drill, sorry, as opposed to kind of mixing it by hand. But if you're doing small batches, you know what I mean, by all means use a whisk, use your KitchenAid. I've done that a couple of times, KitchenAid works really well. But the key thing to say is you want the mixture as wet as you can possibly get it. Like, I'll do a couple of shots showing the kind of consistency again as you're mixing it. But you almost want it kind of on the verge of curdling. So if you're doing that cake mix where you're kind of putting the eggs in and it starts to curdle, that's the mixture that you want 24 hours before. So you couldn't use that mixture straight into a hive, it would just all fall through the frames. But if you're mixing up like I am 24 hours in advance, make sure it's nice and wet, and then that way it toughens up overnight and then you get it at the perfect consistency. But again, follow the recipe. I'll put the recipe up again. That's the recipe that works. You might need to tweak it kind of due to the climate that you're in or the conditions at the time. I mean, you can just kind of sense it, add a little bit more sugar syrup or add a little bit more pollen sub. I wouldn't add anything else to the recipe. Some beekeepers kind of add other bits and bobs in there. I don't think there's any need for it. All the vitamins and protein that the bees need are in that pollen sub. It's like £60, £70, £80 a bag depending depending at which time of year you get it, so it should have all the good stuff in it. You shouldn't really need to add anything else in there. You don't want to be adding stuff that's not suitable for bees, so do just stick to the key core ingredients, which is the pollen bee sub, water, sugar, and vegetable oil. That's it, nothing else. Um, again, I'm going and treating my hives with this pollen sub over the weekend because they're very, very low on pollen. So make sure if you're doing these pollen patties, make sure your bees need them. Otherwise, it's just wasted money. You can get really, really good build-up on them, so I'll mention this more in the kind of application video, but you need to be careful if you've got very, very big strong colonies and there's no natural pollen around and you start feeding them pollen sub. You're opening yourself up to a risk of early swarming, so you do need to kind of keep track on that. Around here, it's good. You need to build them up for the flows because the flows come early, not necessarily when the bees are at their strongest, so pollen sub works really well in North Wales. And it works especially well if you're expanding as well. So if you're looking to kind of make splits, make nucs, and honey isn't your main priority, then pollen subs are a really, really good kind of habit to get into. You get big, booming, strong colonies early, early in the year, which you can do various splits with. So I'll filter back and do a few more kind of cuts as to the consistency that you're looking for. But like I say, you're looking at that kind of half-curdled consistency. Just past that. So you want it smooth, you want all of the powder to be fully incorporated, you want all the liquid to be fully incorporated. It should be a smooth kind of homogeneous mix, but you want to be bordering on that curdling. So effectively, you want to get as much sugar syrup as you can get into that as you possibly can without it not being able to kind of come together. So follow the recipe and you'll be fine, and look at the video, you'll get a kind of feel for the consistency, but just get it as close as you can. If you're making pollen sub to use directly on the day, then it's different and you need to kind of just follow the recipe and use it as it is. But just be wary that it probably is a bit sloppy. I would always recommend making it, leaving it 24 hours, and then using it. And then you kind of, you know, the consistency that you're going to be working with then. So that's it again for the video. Short video, how to make pollen sub using BeePro, uh, sugar syrup and oil. That's it, nothing else. Um, if you've got colonies that are kind of struggling and they haven't got enough protein in the hive, maybe try it out, get a couple of pollen patties on. You can buy the patties direct from Bee Equipment UK ready-made. But they're a lot more expensive. So as always, I like to do things as cheap as practically possible whilst keeping the bees' best interests at heart. So I use the big bags and mix it up myself, and I'd recommend you do the same. It also comes in a 10 lb pail, so if you want to make patties but you don't want to do it on this scale, they also do it on a 10 lb pail, which is a fifth of the size of this bag, and then that's really kind of cost-effective. I think that's like £20 for the So have a go, maybe post in the comments, tell me what you think. But thanks again for watching. Please hit the subscribe button, hit the bell so you're notified of every video. Pray for some decent weather, and I'll see you next time. Bye.