A lot is written about how important dandelions (Taraxacum officinale) are to the honey bee. Indeed, honey bees flock to dandelions both in the early spring and in times of dearth when little else is in bloom. But unlike some other pollen plants, dandelions are only a mediocre food source.
The problem, it seems, is that dandelions are missing some of the amino acids needed to manufacture protein. You can think of amino acids like letters in the alphabet–you need all 26 letters if you’re going to form all the words. Likewise, a bee needs a full complement of the necessary amino acids if it is going to make all the proteins it needs to raise young bees.
Of the set of amino acids that bees need, dandelion pollen falls short of four: arginine, isoleucine, leucine, and valine. Researchers have found that honey bees fed dandelion pollen alone have low success at raising brood. In fact, some researchers found that that honey bees fail to raise any brood when fed dandelion pollen alone.
Remember, dandelion pollen is not toxic, it’s just not complete. Potatoes are not toxic either, but if you ate only potatoes you’d be missing important parts of your diet.
Bees, like humans, need a varied diet from a number of sources to be healthy. The dandelion problem is a good example of what can happen if bees are fed a single pollen (monoculture) diet. Although some pollens are better sources than others, the best thing for the bees (or us) is to eat a wide variety of foods.
Rusty
Bee rolling in dandelion pollen. Creative Commons photo by Guerin Nicolas.
[...] My online buddy Rusty of HoneybeeSuite.com has been here ahead of me. She wrote in June 2010 Honey bees cannot survive on dandelions alone and explained that dandelion pollen does not contain 4 important amino acids. I think my [...]
Do you have any ideal of the pollen content of Colts Foot. Bees forage heavily on Colts Foot early in the year and store a good bit of it. I have tried to find amino acid content and overall protein content and cannot seem to find anything. Any thoughts?
In my neck of the woods the first pollen source is the common alder, which I think is a low quality protein source as it is wind pollinated. But the colts foot the bees hit hard and fast just after the alder, followed by pussy willow, then red maple. At that point there are multiple pollen sources for the bees to feed on.
Wow, Jeff, colts foot isn’t one of those plants that people run out and analyze all the time. I’ll have a look around but I doubt there’s a lot of research on it.
[...] * Rusty and this study say valine, isoleucine, leucine and arginine, my course notes by Dr. Pernal say tryptophane, phenylalanine and arginine [...]
I don’t know anything about Colts Foot, but the bees in our backyard are bringing in pollen all over the place — a rainbow of pollen. Yellow, orange, green, blue, purple. At least that’s what my colour blind eyes tell me. Foraging in an urban environment, my guess is they’re getting it from crocuses and other early-blooming planted flowers. The bees show little interest in the pollen patties I’ve given them.
What I’m more concerned about is reversing our boxes too early. I know the earlier the better is often a steadfast rule, but I don’t know. I still see plenty of bees in the bottom boxes of all my hives. I wouldn’t want to split up the brood nest.
Still no dandelions around here. Maple buds are just starting to show. I looked around too much at flowers on the ground last year. I hardly ever looked up into the trees. Do regular nothing fancy maples trees have flowers that attract bees? If so, I think our bees will do alright. This city is packed with maple trees and other coniferous trees.
I wish I could stay home and watch them all day.
All the maples that I know about attract bees; they have loads of nectar.
Yeah.