Brood-Rearing Enhancing Potential of Manually Packed Pollen Feeding in Comparison with Pollen and Pollen Supplements in Patty Forms

Abstract Dearth-period pollen or pollen supplement feedings have become a common practice to maintain and stimulate the early buildup of honeybee colonies. Not only amount, type and consumption rate of feeds are important but the conversion and its nutrient availability are essential. In the current study, we investigated how honey bee colony's brood rearing enhanced by feeding natural pollen powder (packed on cells of drawn-out combs) in comparison with patty forms natural-pollen, Mega-bee and Ultra-bee pollen substitutes during dearth period. The study showed that colonies given the pollen powder (packed on cells of drawn out combs) immediately converted it into beebread similar to naturally collected pollen. The colonies in the packed pollen-powder group showed consistent increment and on average reared 86.3% more brood than the patty-form natural pollen, Mega-bee and Ultra-bee pollen substitutes, without having significant differences in their consumption rate. The colonies in the packed-pollen group performed better might be because the conversion of the packed-pollen powder into beebread allows better nutrient availability due to its fermentation by nest microbes and further biosynthesis process. Moreover, the presence of beebread from packed-pollen adjacent to the brood combs represents the natural way of feed reserve storage which might also contribute to the stimulation of brood rearing in colonies better than feeding in patty-forms of natural pollen, Mega-bee and Ultra-bee. Packed-pollen feeding as an alternative to patty forms could improve dearth period maintenance and early population building of colonies.