Research at Blackhawk

If you were out on the course last Thursday or on Friday morning, you may have noticed some PVC pipe sticking out of the ground on holes 3 and 7.

This was done to collect data relating to Japanese Beetles, in collaboration with the UW-Madison and University of Purdue Entomology departments. The experiment will be repeated once later this year.

The UW-Madison Entomology department has also been collecting pollen from the honey bees. The goal is to analyze the makeup of the pollen. They will be looking at the composition of the pollen and at the different sources of pollen during different times of the year.

Each "bead" in the bag is a conglomoration of pollen that falls off the leg of the bee as it goes into the hive. Some people believe pollen gathered by bees has special restorative properties. While it is ounce for ounce relatively nutritious the evidence of any special properties is dubious at best. I had a little taste of it one day while the pollen trap was being emptied. It tasted like tutti frutti bubble gum and had a chalky consistency. At  around $4.50 per ounce I don't plan on adding it to my daily diet.

Filling comb with honey

I hope you agree it is worthwhile to partner with the UW-Madison. Participating in research projects helps to keep Blackhawk on the cutting edge of the newest science and that's always a plus.