feeding bees sugar syrup

stonecroppefarm · October 13, 2011, 11:57:28 PM

Any thoughts on how much stored honey is produced for each pound of dry sugar in syrup fed to bees?

Shanevrr · October 14, 2011, 12:34:31 AM

Technically its not honey, you can only get honey from nectar. I'm gonna guess 1 1/4 lbs of stores since they have mix water with it to store it. Someone correct me if Im wrong.

Michael Bush · October 14, 2011, 02:25:31 AM

None. :) Honey is basically 5:1 sugar to water. So if you feed 2:1 syrup, they have to remove at least half of the water to get it close to 5:1. Try it this way. For every 6 pounds of capped stores, you have to feed 5 pounds of sugar in your syrup. The water is not relevant except for the work required to dry it.

Shanevrr · October 14, 2011, 08:54:45 AM

So for 1lb of sugar you would get about 1.275 lbs round about?

Finski · October 14, 2011, 09:22:38 AM

.
I have read that when syrup is stored to capped food, 24% of sugar is consumed as enegy in the process. Especially wax making needs much sugar.

All biological processes use energy (food).

Let's calculate...final store has 17% moisture.

100 minus 24% =76

76*1,17 =89 ....store is about 90 from 100 units.

windfall · October 14, 2011, 09:24:39 AM

If 5:1 by mass then you would add 1/5 or .2lbs of water to reach stored syrup density, so 1 lb sugar would be 1.2 lbs stores...assuming no other consumption

what finski says makes sense. Certainly it must take some energy to process.

JackM · October 14, 2011, 10:07:11 AM

Not sure if I should ask in this thread or not, but why doesn't anyone use Karo syrup to feed? Expense? Wrong kind of sugar?

organicfarmer · October 14, 2011, 07:15:44 PM

There are few threads on corn syrup. Commercial beekeepers (but not only) use corn syrup since it is cheap. It is as far as possible to what bees would use; i believe (only personal belief shared by many others) it is un-natural and harmful to bees. They will not overwinter as well on HFCS as on honey, with sugar somewhere in between. The best is not to have to feed, leaving enough honey to the hive, robbing the strong to give the weak (w/out endangering the strong), storing honey frames for later...
Ultimately it is almost a "philosophical" question, your philosophy of hive management.

Shanevrr · October 14, 2011, 10:21:07 PM

So you would be pretty close to a lb of storage vs a lb of sugar based off of energy consumption

FRAMEshift · October 14, 2011, 11:09:29 PM

Quote from: Shanevrr on October 14, 2011, 10:21:07 PM
So you would be pretty close to a lb of storage vs a lb of sugar based off of energy consumption

Yes, assuming the bees are drawing new wax to store the syrup in. If you have existing drawn comb you would get more than 1 lb of stores. It is not likely that the bees are drawing much wax this time of year. More likely that they will backfill the broodnest.

windfall · October 14, 2011, 11:57:06 PM

But even if they are not drawing new wax, they will have to expend energy to cure it down to 5:1 from whatever concentration they receive it at...most likely 2:1.

It can take a lot of calories to evaporate water depending on ambient conditions. I wonder what potion of Finski's 24% is accounted for by that?