# pollen analysis/melissopalynology



## Kuro (Jun 18, 2015)

Throughout the past year I did bee-pollen microscopy, just for fun. I looked about 3500 samples, found ~80 different kinds, and named ~60 of them, some to the species and others only to the genus or to the family names. Pollen microscopy was especially interesting when neither one of cherry/plum, maple, blackberry or ivy (the plants that give the major pollen flows here) was in full bloom, because that was when I found unexpected. I found several flowers that I overlooked, only after the bees brought their pollens. Some bee-pollens were very unique in shapes and/or colors, yet could not be named, even after I hand-collected pollen from ~500 different flowers in the neighborhood to compare with. 

I pick pollen from a dead forager's hind legs or from a corrugated plastic board inserted into the hive bottom (or under the screen bottom) onto a slide glass (bought at Amazon.com), put a drop of glycerin (bought at a drugstore), press a coverglass onto, and immediately take pictures. After that I wash the glasses with warm water and reuse. No fixing or staining. Because pollen sizes are pretty much in the range of 10 - 100 micrometers, I use one of the cheapest digital microscopes with fixed 800x optical magnification (about US $90 at Amazon, https://www.amazon.com/Plugable-Inverted-Digital-Microscope-Magnification/dp/B072N96D24) connected to my laptop. It takes some practice to get good pictures but you probably do not need a special training to do this. When it comes to identifying your bee-pollen, however, you have to compare it with flower pollen pictures that were prepared exactly in the same manner. The majority found on the web (such as ‘pollenwiki’ https://pollen.tstebler.ch/MediaWiki/index.php?title=Pollenatlas) use some fixing/staining reagents. Therefore, you should either prepare your bee-pollen using their method or prepare your reference flower pollen samples yourself (I chose to do the latter). 

This link shows some of my bee pollen pictures, 800x. https://photos.app.goo.gl/Nz2FEUwXMVohtq3W6
1. hazelnut, heath, size standard
2. crocus, cherry/plum, hyacinth
3. dandelion, red/silver maple, size standard
4. camellia, willow, rhododendron
5. holly, red osier dogwood, size standard
6. horse chestnut, tulip poplar, poppy
7. birdsfoot trefoil, southern magnolia, linden

Have fun!


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## Peter Armitage (Feb 11, 2017)

Thanks for your reply Kuro. Interesting!


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## little_john (Aug 4, 2014)

Peter Armitage said:


> How useful is the pollen analysis training to beekeepers in the U.K.?


It isn't. Indeed, I've never seen much point in beekeepers identifying pollen sources - other than for curiosity (or fun) - as they can't actually do anything practical with such superficial information. With regard to the BBKA, I suspect this is just so much 'content padding' to justify having a certificate in something-or-other. 
LJ


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