Bee syrup

[Big ears]

With the use of neonicatinoids licensed for sugar beet and the fact that most of the proprietary syrup brands use sugar beet as their source of sugar, am I better to make my own syrup from cane sugar?

honest question from a complete newbee

BE

 

[enrico]

Once refined I doubt it makes much difference! Only use while refined sugar

 

[Boston Bees]

With the use of neonicatinoids licensed for sugar beet and the fact that most of the proprietary syrup brands use sugar beet as their source of sugar, am I better to make my own syrup from cane sugar?

honest question from a complete newbee

BE

Two things

a) neonics don't make it through to the sugar itself
b) you think that cane sugar is made without pesticides? In those highly regulated environmentally-focused countries like Brazil, India and China? Google "sugarcane pesticides"

 

[Ian123]

Beet sugar is fine this question/concern has been done to death before and is not a problem

 

[Big ears]

I’m sorry I was going over old ground I didn’t realise this.
thank you for your replies.

 

[jenkinsbrynmair]

With the use of neonicatinoids licensed for sugar beet and the fact that most of the proprietary syrup brands use sugar beet as their source of sugar, am I better to make my own syrup from cane sugar?

honest question from a complete newbee

BE

I'd be more concerned about the stuff that could be in cane sugar seeing as it comes from countries with little regulation on things like pesticides.
let alone the environmental effect of transporting it halfway around the world.
And I'm sure there are a few other moral reasons for avoiding cane as well.

 

[Amari]

Once refined I doubt it makes much difference! Only use while refined sugar

White, not brown, sugar has been the gospel preached for many decades. Has there ever been a comparative study, or is it like many other gospels - blindly accepted by successive generations?

 

[jenkinsbrynmair]

you think that cane sugar is made without pesticides? In those highly regulated environmentally-focused countries like Brazil, India and China? Google "sugarcane pesticides"

Cane sugar has been the gospel chanted by the BBKAites since at least 1945 even thought it was totally debunked way back in 1947 and proven to be nothing but protectionist propaganda spread by Tate&Lyle (who at that time was a British company) who feared loss of revenue to the burgeoning European beet sugar producers.

White, not brown, sugar has been the gospel preached for many decades. Has there ever been a comparative study, or is it like many other gospels - blindly accepted by successive generations?

I believe Murray McGregor has used brown in the past - as well as golden syrup, I think there has been a discussion on here regarding that.

 

[pargyle]

I’m sorry I was going over old ground I didn’t realise this.
thank you for your replies.

No apologies necessary .. we expect the same questions to be asked by new beekeepers and normally you will get straightforward (oft repeated) answers ... the etiquette, in the beginners section, is that references to past discussions should be accompanied by a link to the relevant thread ... Ian123 should be the one apologising. We will slap his wrist ... though, in fairness, he usually offers fulsome advice.

Personally, I've given up making my own syrup .. I buy Invertbee - yes, it probably costs me a few pounds more than making my own but I don't make a living from keeping bees and I accept it as a legitimate way of spending some of the revenue from selling honey.

Your question about the possibilty of chemicals getting into the sugar food chain .. probably not something you need to worry about - there's plenty of other things to worry about when keeping bees to keep you occupied !

 

[mdotb]

White, not brown, sugar has been the gospel preached for many decades. Has there ever been a comparative study, or is it like many other gospels - blindly accepted by successive generations?

Old paper but:

Considerations in Selecting Sugars for Feeding to Honey Bees (Barker, "Considerations in Selecting Sugars for Feeding to Honey Bees", American Bee Journal, February, 1977) discusses quite well and briefly the fact that there are (were in 1977) studies showing varying effects on bee mortality from different sugars and non-sugar constituents of sugar products, but that frankly there was no real understanding of why. It does cite evidence of higher bee mortality on exclusive diets of unrefined sugars, and mixed results obtained by Bailey on semi-refined sugars. Refined sugar, being almost exclusively sucrose was concluded to be the "best" feed source by that author, despite them also stating that HFCS was fed "without adverse effects but with no survival advantage over sucrose" (implying that it is "equally good" and thus also "best"?)

There are plenty of more recent studies comparing sugar syrups, or sugar syrup to honey, as sole feed sources, but unrefined sugar doesn't seem to come up very often - it's quite possible that old studies showing it had low(er) survival rates (than refined sugars or honey) have been sufficiently widely accepted that it's simply not looked at anymore.

 

[Erichalfbee]

I believe Murray McGregor has used brown in the past - as well as golden syrup, I think there has been a discussion on here regarding that.

https://beekeepingforum.co.uk/threads/syrup-construct.49585/page-4#post-787576

 

[Ian123]

... Ian123 should be the one apologising. We will slap his wrist ... though, in fairness, he usually offers fulsome advice.

What am I meant to be apologetic for, my reply may have been short but is in no way rude to the OP.

 

[Ian123]

Brown Sugar anyone!

 

[pargyle]

What am I meant to be apologetic for, my reply may have been short but is in no way rude to the OP.

I think you have missed the point ... this is the beginners section - the OP may not have the knowledge of what has gone before and may also, critically, not have a full grasp of the search function - which is, at times, a bit cranky. I have no issue with pointing out that a subject has been discussed fully in the past but if you are going to take that route the it would have been more beneficial to point the OP in the direction of where to look. If you could not be bothered to look and post a link then why bother posting at all.

Just a matter of ethos in the beginners section and as I said, not your usual style ? Got up on the wrong side of the bed ?