Syrup “honey”

[Tony Slater]

The honey bee has 3 variants of alpha-glucosidase (invertase) in 3 locations (ventricle, hemolymph, and hypopharyngeal glands). It is the latter, alpha-glucosidase III found in the hypopharyngeal glands, that is naturally transferred to honey. This invertase is not present in nurse bees, so age is a limiting factor in honey production or the ability to process nectar.

Thanks, that’s helpful. So when a bee is taking syrup from the feeder into its honey stomach, it is involuntarily mixing invertase - other enzymes - with it and the sucrose is being broken down into glucose and fructose. Its then stored in comb and dehydrated in the normal way, presumably down to 18% water (or thereabouts).

I think this is all accurate. So, m