In this tutorial Laurence Edwards explains why the late‑season ivy nectar and pollen flow is arguably the most important resource for honeybee colonies heading into winter. He describes how the ivy flow provides a final boost of carbohydrate and, more critically, a large supply of protein that enables colonies to build weight and prepare brood for early spring. Edwards outlines how to recognize the ivy flow—bees streaming at the entrance from mid‑September, pale yellow pollen on their legs, and open nectar stored in frames—and demonstrates a hive inspection that confirms the flow through visible pollen deposits and nectar. He stresses the need to leave sufficient empty space in the hive so bees can store the incoming pollen and nectar, and details his feeding regimen (mid‑August honey harvest, Apivar treatment, and trickle feeding through September) to sustain colonies if the flow fails. Finally, he highlights the importance of locating the queen during the end‑of‑season inspection to avoid crushing her, and shows how a well‑filled winter frame with brood, pollen, and open nectar indicates a colony set for a successful overwintering and strong spring growth.
Chapters
The ivy flow is probably the most important flow of the year. In this video, I'm going to tell you how to identify when your bees have found it, but also why it's so important for your bees to overwinter successfully. So it's a little bit strange to say that the ivy flow is the most important because it's probably for most people the crop that you never see in a honey jar. And when you do see it in a honey jar, the battle is then to try and get it out of the honey jar because it sets like concrete, absolutely rock solid. But for the bees, it is the very last opportunity of the season to go out and to collect some nectar, but more importantly than that, to go out and collect copious amounts of pollen. Now you can see the bees at the moment just streaming in with nectar and pollen, and I find the bees will go out and forage in very low temperatures to go out and get the ivy. It's like they sense, they just know that it is their last opportunity to try and boost the weight of that colony going into winter, and also to give them sufficient protein to kickstart that brood rearing again early in the spring. If you think about it, for the bees, they have 2 main food sources. They have carbohydrate, which they eat to give them energy, and then they have protein that they use in order to rear new brood. Now, if the bees don't have the required balance of carbohydrate and protein coming out of winter and going into spring before there is spring pollen available, then what happens to the colony is that it massively restricts its spring growth, 'cause that natural pollen, that natural protein isn't available to give you that explosive growth in the spring. So this is why I say that I think it's probably the most important flow for the bees, because without it you get a real impact into the following season. Take for example the heather, take for example the oilseed rape. If they don't flow, you've still got sufficient time in order to give the bees more food and more time for the bees to go out and collect more pollen. Whereas if you're counting on that ivy flow late on in the year and it doesn't yield anything, or the weather is just too poor, You don't tend to see the results immediately, but you do tend to see the results the following spring. Like, I've noticed this myself over the years, that when you get these nice long extended Indian summers, preferably followed by like quite a sharp cold winter, you see the success of that in the following spring. So before we get into this colony and take a look at some of the bees, some of the nectar, some of the pollen, a quick side note in terms of feeding, and that is to make sure that you leave enough space for your bees to take advantage of the pollen, and the nectar from the ivy. I've made this mistake myself. I see countless other people making this mistake, and that is you get into like the first or second week of September and people say, right, I'm done, bees are ready for winter. There isn't a single cell available for the queen to lay. There isn't a single cell available to store any pollen. You've just got 6 frames ram-packed full of stores. And what happens to that colony is that it either inevitably fails over winter or really struggles to come out into the spring. My rule of thumb, and I've mentioned this on countless other videos now, is around the mid to end of August I take my honey crop, I put my Apivar strips in, I start feeding my bees, and all I'm doing between the middle of August towards the end of September is I'm just keeping the bees going. Trickle feeding, call it what you like, I'm giving them enough to sustain them throughout that 6-week period because I know if the ivy crop completely fails I can come in and And I can give them pollen supplement if it's been a really, really bad year. But generally they come in and they find enough pollen and I can just go in and within a week I can give them enough feed to get them up to weight. If you fed them up to the point where they just can't take in any of the nectar or the pollen from the ivy, they miss out on the protein and then they dwindle hard because that queen cannot lay. For me personally as well, the ivy represents the end of the season, which is always really, really nice. The honey flow's finished, the honey extraction's finished, queen rearing season is over, all of the colonies are treated, most of the colonies are fed to the point where they don't really need that much more food. And for every single day that we get weather like this towards the back end of September and early October, it saves me a few quid as well because I don't have to pay too much money for the additional invert syrup. Ivy flow, my favorite flow of the year, definitely the most important for the bees. Let's take a look now to show you exactly what to look for when the bees are coming in on the ivy. So the first thing to look out for is just general activity at the entrance from, say, mid-Sept— Wow, so that was fun. Very, very close to my eye there. So you know the rule, you always get to see the stings to the face. Probably shouldn't be pushing my luck being this close to the hive entrance here. First thing to look out for is general activity around the entrance from the mid to end of September in the UK. Now that's going to vary from where you are in the UK. Obviously further south it's going to be a little bit earlier, further north it's going to be a little bit later, but there isn't really much available at this point in the year unless you're in an area where you're going to get Himalayan balsam, and then it's very clear to identify that because you're seeing the bees with the white stripe on the back. You're seeing ghost bees going into your hive. So if you're seeing general activity at the entrance, you're seeing bees streaming in, it's the pale yellow pollen That is the key identifier of the ivy pollen. Now if you're seeing this, it's quite easy just to go out, take a look at a patch of ivy, and you will see it buzzing with life. You'll see wasps, you'll see bees, you'll see flies, butterflies, moths, hopefully no Asian hornets, but that's probably where you are going to find them at this point in the year as well. But for me, easiest identifier is looking at the colony of bees, seeing that pale yellow pollen going into the hive, and then it's clear when you open it up you will see copious amounts of yellow pollen being deposited in the frames as well. And then the final indicator is when you go into your colony, which you really don't need to do, but if you do, and we will go in here today, is seeing open nectar being stored in the frames. You can lift it out, you can shake it, you can identify it. I wouldn't recommend it personally because there's no need to do that. But open nectar at this point in the year in the UK is only really going to be one of two things, Himalayan balsam or ivy in any decent quantity. So let's get inside, take a look at some of that pollen, and just see how well these bees are doing going into winter. So you can see there the bees building lots of burr comb on the top. I've worked out what that is now, and that is me messing around with ventilated roofs with covers, giving them way too much space. So we'll fix all of that before the end of the season. Now you can see this split here is probably on like 3 or 4 frames, 14 by 12 frames. Going to be plenty of bees to get this one through the winter in a poly hive. Let's get inside, see if we can see any evidence of ivy coming in. So that's a really, really good sign there. The bees are not only storing nectar, but there is evidence that they are drawing out the foundation as well. These frames here, notoriously difficult to get them to draw them out without a flow-on. So the fact that they are drawing it out indicates to me that there is a flow-on at the moment. Open nectar being stored in those frames here. These bees have not been fed for a couple of weeks, so anything that they would have been fed before that, you would I think would be capped by now as well. So lovely frame there, winter frame, brood in all stages. Got lots of nice pollen on that frame as well. Now before I lay the frames down, really important at this point in the year, find where your queen is first, get her on a nice safe frame. Do not crush your queen at the end of the season or this colony is game over. So there's my queen, beautiful F1 Buckfast queen. She is doing the business. Hopefully you can see there, she's laying up all of that in the middle. Good larva there. Now that I know where my queen is, I'm just gonna pop her off over there, and I'll pull out a couple of the frames and show you how I know that this colony is feeding on the ivy. So this here is pretty much a perfect winter frame. Look at that brood pattern, absolutely beautiful. Open nectar on the outside, which means I know that there's a flow on. You've got bees coming in with that pale yellow pollen on their legs. You've got bees Backfilling the center of the brood nest, which is a standard winter trait, with yellow pollen. And then they're putting that yellow pollen all the way around the ring of brood as well. You can see it in all those locations. Pretty much every single cell there that you can see with pollen in, that is going to be ivy pollen. So there we go, this colony here set up perfectly for winter. Nice strong colony, good amount of brood, The ivy's in flow, nectar and pollen coming in. If you're seeing this in your colonies, your bees should be really set well for winter, and hopefully they make it through to spring with no issues whatsoever.
