Photos documenting a pilot study I conducted with the beekeepers who run the 5th Street Apiary here in Lexington during summer 2013. This work is part of project I have been incubating for several hundred years. The only thing lacking now is a student who would be interested in expanding it for a thesis or dissertation. The study I have been envisioning examines relationships between pollen composition collected by honey bees, its nutritional content (as measured by amino acids), and surrounding land uses. Here is a summary of a recent NSF proposal submission.
This photo at left shows the iButton temperature probe we installed in the hives to track the internal temperatures.
These are the colonies monitored for a period of two months. On the front of each hive trimmed in yellow paint are the pollen traps. They collect pollen off the foraging bees as they return to the hive.
