Effect of feeding sugar, etc on bee lifespan

[viridens]

IMPACT OF DIFFERENT FEED ON INTESTINE HEALTH OF HONEY BEES. Goran Mirjanic, Ivana Tlak Gajger, Mica Mladenovic, Zvonimir Kozaric

I came across a reference to this 2013 paper on this subject on a Warre beekeeping website. I don't think it has been discussed here before. (My apology if I missed it!)

A key table of findings is shown below, and you can download the full paper from my dropbox here: Mirjanic etal 2013 Apimodia paper.pdf

The effect of feed source on the longevity of winter bees​

 

[user 20277]

That's very interesting. I'm a very new beek, don't even have bees yet, waiting for my bee keepers course to start and reading Ted Hoopers highly acclaimed book. Today I read about getting them ready for winter, calculating food reserves and how much syrup to feed them to ensure they have sufficient stocks to see them through the winter and my first thought was why would you do that. Why not take less honey from the hive and leave the bees enough to tide them over. Apart from the economic argument is there any reason why you shouldn't leave a super with honey stores in it for the bees to use. While the bees can obviously take the syrup and make honey out of it my gut instinct was that it is probably not the best thing to do (for the bees) and the research above would seem to support that.

 

[Murox]

I think the papers subtle conclusions really need highlighting ~
“Based on our research, it can be concluded that feeding with different food sources has different influence on the digestive tract of bees, especially in the midgut epithelial layer.

Natural source of food for bees - honey had no harmful effects on the midgut epithelial layer, and the intestinal contents were completely attached to this layer, which leads to the quality of digestion and maximum nutrient resorption. Similar results were got when feeding bees with sugar syrup and enzyme inverted syrup without the addition of yeast and malt.

This means that each addition of yeast and malt lead to damage to the midgut epithelial layer, and the differences arise, depending on food source.

The most serious damage on the epithelial layer was found in mid gut of bees fed with acidic invert syrup (in all examined combinations).

Regarding the impact of different feed on the length of life of bees, it can be concluded that feeding with honey, enzyme invert sugar syrup had a positive effect on the life span of bees, while addition of brewer's yeast and wort shortens the life of bees. So recommendation is to use supplemental feeding without them, and that the use of these supplements should be more practiced during other seasons, especially if there is no natural pollen.”

The final sentence seems to suggest that yeast and wort may be useful at times of pollen shortage.
There seems to be a question to be asked about the life span of winter bees - the study is about the Average life span of bees (days) in three years of the study.

 

[Apple]

What is Belsuc invert?

 

[jenkinsbrynmair]

What is Belsuc invert?

Belgosuc, like the majority of commercial inverts is enzyme inverted

 

[Apple]

Belgosuc, like the majority of commercial inverts is enzyme inverted

Thanks for that... my marvelous Cornish Amm have had a ton this Autumn... so will live forever!

Chons da

 

[Finman]

First, every animal has enzymes in its gut, which invert/ split sucrose into fructose and glucose. No sucrose go into blood circulation.

Second. My bees live with sucrose 8-9 months from September to May. At the beginning of May willows start to give pollen. Bees start brood rearing.

When new bees start to emerge, wintered bees go to work outside. As foragers they die very soon. At the end of May no winter bees are alibe.

When life cycle goes this way what I can do then.

In summer all bees are fed with pollen and nectar.

In May, if bees do not get enough pollen, They eate larvi. That is really s short life.

 

[Amari]

When new bees start to emerge, wintered bees go to work outside. As foragers they die very soon. At the end of May no winter bees are alibe.
When life cycle goes this way what I can do then.
In summer all bees are fed with pollen and nectar.
In May, if bees do not get enough pollen, They eate larvi. That is really s short life.

....and a very short season. I admire your efforts (electric heaters etc) to keep the bees alive over such a long winter. Are there beekeepers further north than you or are you on the geographical limit ?

 

[Ian123]

IMPACT OF DIFFERENT FEED ON INTESTINE HEALTH OF HONEY BEES. Goran Mirjanic, Ivana Tlak Gajger, Mica Mladenovic, Zvonimir Kozaric

I came across a reference to this 2013 paper on this subject on a Warre beekeeping website. I don't think it has been discussed here before. (My apology if I missed it!)

A key table of findings is shown below, and you can download the full paper from my dropbox here: Mirjanic etal 2013 Apimodia paper.pdf

The effect of feed source on the longevity of winter bees​

View attachment 22242

This study has been quoted here before, I think a more relevant piece would have been life span whilst wintering bees. In contradiction I think it’s a Canadian study that shows benefits to bees wintering on syrup as less buy products to digest ie pollen and less need to deficate in extreme temps. Also is the study showing like for like there feeding honey a finished product compared (although bees thin it to consume) to syrup that requires processing. Is it this processing that shortens the life span a little. Perhaps they should have been feed nectar that requires processing as well? We are all aware that a worker bees life span is at it shortest in the summer effectively working flat out could this processing be part of that. On a purely personal note I’ve done a number of very late cut outs over the years, I never bother trying to save stores purely the brood. Along with some wintered mini Nucs these survive probably 90% on syrup. I’ve never seen anything to concern me . Ian

 

[IndiBee]

Not surprising. I don't feed bees. Locally adapted bees just don't need it.
I ensure they live in a large enough space to have stores in the worst of conditions. Never put a super on till the brood box has 4 frames of honey. Mind you that is a 12x14 frame box. Local bees can cope with weeks of rain and they so often come out of winter and get to the nectar flow with plenty of honey spare. They know what they are doing.
Exotics on the other hand..............

 

[Finman]

....and a very short season. I admire your efforts (electric heaters etc) to keep the bees alive over such a long winter. Are there beekeepers further north than you or are you on the geographical limit ?

I do not warm bees during winter. I set up heaters when hives start brooding. Actually heatets warm up hives during May.

Heating hives with electric is extremely rare in my country. My hives are 20 km from south coast. The most northern hives are about 500 km from me to north.

 

[Finman]

Not surprising. I don't feed bees. Locally adapted bees just don't need it.

They know what they are doing.
Exotics on the other hand..............

You really have imagination. Every beehive is locally afapted, or they die off in winter.

Honey is so expencive, that it makes no sense to overwinter bees with that.

20 kg sugar is worth £ 12 and as honey it is £ 200 .

If I get on average 60-80 kg honey per hive, I take all honey off. They do not need it but I need. Beekeeping is very ecpencive hobby, if you do not sell honey.

 

[IndiBee]

You really have imagination. Every beehive is locally afapted, or they die off in winter.

Honey is so expencive, that it makes no sense to overwinter bees with that.

20 kg sugar is worth £ 12 and as honey it is £ 200 .

If I get on average 60-80 kg honey per hive, I take all honey off. They do not need it but I need. Beekeeping is very ecpencive hobby, if you do not sell honey.

Yes, you are right, honey is very expensive, the most valuable asset for the bees. And your most valuable assets are the bees themselves.
The bees are my most valuable asset. But beekeeping is not a hobby for me, it is a business. Honey is not my main output and productivity per hive is never the bottom line. Productivity and survival of the apiaries as a whole is far more important to me.
I never take from the brood box unless they are honey bound and the Q needs room to lay. Then I 'borrow' and return if they need it or if another hive needs it. Sugar (as seems to be postulated in the study talked about), has never been something I have wanted to give to the bees, nor my father in law who gave me the business, as he strongly believed sugar to be bad for bees. His contemporaries would stimulate hives with a saucer of sugar water, but no one we knew gave the amounts of sugar as is common now. Why feed anything when they can feed themselves? Just because it is cheaper then honey?
What I take is from supers and they give me plenty. Maybe not per hive, but when I want more product I just make more hives.
The more I see of these modern beekeepers the more I realize why they have so much problems. The long term suvival of each collony has to be number one. Not short term output from each hive IMHO.

 

[Finman]

The basic idea in honey production is that bees gather winter stores and you change it to cheap sugar.

If you over winter bees with honey, that I call "catch anf reliese".

Professional beekeepers push the brooding so tight with excluder, that there is any more honey in brood box, when last extraction happens.

 

[Finman]

Honey is not my main output and productivity per hive is never the bottom line. Productivity and survival of the apiaries as a whole is far more important to me.
.

I do not even know, where you live. I live in Finland and bees live here splended with sugar.

If you feed your honey yield to bees, honey is not important then. Why to mock then guys, which feed hives with sugar.

If you have some another goal in your beekeeping than honey, I do not know what it is, because you did not tell.

 

[Erichalfbee]

If you have some another goal in your beekeeping than honey, I do not know what it is, because you did not tell.

Wax

 

[IndiBee]

The basic idea in honey production is that bees gather winter stores and you change it to cheap sugar.

I am not a honey producer, I collect wax for cosmetics. But from what I know of older methods, the honey taken was the surplus, not everything the bees had and replace it with sugar. Do the bees not produce surplus in Finland?

 

[Finman]

Do the bees not produce surplus in Finland?

They produce honey. When I started berkeeping 60 years ago, the average yied was 15-20 kg. It is same, what bees consumed during winter.

Now I my goal is to get on average 60-80 kg/hive. If it does not succeed, I change the pasture.

 

[Finman]

Original question was, can a beekeeper feed sugar to bees. Yes they do everywhere around the world. And no need to invert the sugar.

Does a beekeeper sell honey? Yes they do.

 

[Finman]

Wax

There was a time when hives were the most important to produce wax to chuch candles.

But nowadays honey is the most important.

If someone collects medical wax, it is his business. And he is a very good human.


But it does not make him able to insist, that sugar is poison to bees.