# Pollen substitue in extracted honey



## crofter (May 5, 2011)

Later season honey is commonly much darker. I doubt the color is from the pollen pattie. Generally not advisable to have any sort of feed on while honey supers present. As long as they are not medicated patties I would not be concerned for personal consumption. You would get raked over the coals a bit for that


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## DBJ (Oct 10, 2021)

Thank you. Non-medicated patties. Just normal Bee-Pro patties. My original intention was to let the bees have have all of the honey until an old timer warned me about the bees needing to warm the extra space. Live and learn! Thanks again.


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## John Davis (Apr 29, 2014)

The "old timer" is not correct in saying they have to warm the extra space. They keep the cluster warm and do lose heat to the surrounding area but are not maintaining a hive temp. As long as they stay in contact with the food they came pass it from bee to bee and generate heat. You are managing population to space.


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## DBJ (Oct 10, 2021)

Thank you, John. That makes sense. The ambient temperature in the hive is going to pretty much the same everywhere the cluster is not. They would have just moved up as far as needed to through the food. Would they have just left the excess honey there to start out the new season with? I would rather have left the honey on there for them. Being my first year, I'm really just giving the honey to family and friends anyway. That's why I wanted to make sure it was safe for humans to eat.


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