Most of the discussions in last days are arguing about honey or sugar
for wintering. Those who pointed out, that honey is bad for winter,
mentioned possible high mineral content in honey. Such high mineral
content is present in honey when bees collect honeydew (stated also by
Murray McGregor). Too high mineral level is one possible cause of
dysentery in the late winter or early spring.
 
The second reason is high level of some oligosaharides in honeydew
honey. One of such is MELIZITOSE which can not be digested by bees or
its digestion is incomparable with digestion of saharose. When bees
suddenly eat higher amounts of such honey, melizitose can not be
absorbed from the intestine into the blood and it has too bee defecated.
Such bees could also lose some water, since melizitose drag some water
into the intestine from the hemolymph. Such bees get dysentery and they
can be easily infected by Nosema or other intestinal parasites or
microorganisms. Bees are well adopted to saharose presence in food.
There is a lot of scientific data on that. Digestion is usually not a
problem.
 
Honey could be very good for over wintering, but it depends on source.
More the two hundred years ago and also until middle of this century
slovene beekeepers were lucky to have 1/3 of fields covered with
buckwheat, which offered great pasture in late summer and early fall.
Bees build up a lot of brood, beekeeper could extract over 10 kg of
honey per colony and still left enough in the hive for wintering. This
time is over. Beekeepers have to feed bees and they are using sugar not
only because it is cheaper but also safer due to possible problems
caused by honeydew honey.