For the last couple of years, we have been conducting a survey of the
weight of the package bees that were picked up by various beeks in this
area from a various suppliers.

The protocol is to weigh the package of bees as received​; package, syrup
can, bees, queen and cage, everything just before shaking the bees into a
colony.  This can be done with a kitchen scale right in the bee yard.  Then
weighing everything again, making certain that all of the components of the
package are kept together (without the queen cage).  A Benton queen cage
weighs about 1/2 ounce and a JZ-BZ queen cage weighs about 1/8 ounce.  The
weight of the cage is not a significant factor in the weighing package bees.

My assumptions have been that as long as the package has  ample food /
syrup or other nutrition sources, subtracting the before installation
weight and after installation package weights would give not only the
weight of the bees in the package as installed but also close to the
initial weight of bees in the package as long as there were few dead bees.
The amount of syrup consumed is used by the bees to maintain their
metabolic functions and the weight of the bees would remain a relative
constant as long as there was sufficient nutrition.

This year I have been challenged by a supplier in that the initial weight
of the bees in the package is equal to the final weight of the bees in the
package PLUS the weight of the syrup consumed.  I do not believe that this
is correct.  But my assumptions may be flawed.

I do believe that there may be some weight losses due to the stresses of
bees in packages ans in shipping but...

The example specifically being cited was the purchase of a package that the
supplier states that had #3 of bees shipped.  The package was weighed per
the above protocol and the weight of the bees were 2#-4 oz, when
installed.  The syrup can was less than 1/2 full and ( in my opinion by
happenstance), the calculated weight of syrup missing added to the 2#-4 oz
of bees almost equaled 3#.

But this would mean that the bees lost 25% of their weight [(final
weight-initial weight) / initial weight] or in other words, the weight of
the bees at installation is 75% of their initial weight (final weight /
initial weight)

Historically (2-3 years worth of sketchy data) indicates that a local
vendor that purchases bees from a Georgia apiary constantly has packages
with 2.5# of bees (syrup cans over 1.2 full) and that a different vendor
that purchase bees from a California apiary has packages that weigh
consistently over 3# and as high as 4# with syrup cans at 1/4 full or
less.  Limited data set for both though.

This weighing of packages is the only QC we have as to what is the weight
of bees are actually in a package of bees. Our only attempt to verify that
the suppliers as shipping what the state they are shipping.

Comments on anticipated weight loss on a packages with ample nutritional
stores or other comments are invited.

Dennis
very western New York State, USA

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