> Here's good article if you think artificial sugars should not be fed to honeybees like I do!! The article talks about both bumblebees and honeybees.

The study does not implicate the feeding of sugar syrup in any way. What they did was to hatch bees out in incubators and isolate them from their colony to see if the newly born bees obtain microbes from the colony. The newborn bees were fed sugar syrup because it does not contain any microbes. Of course, the bees did poorly. We already new that most organisms obtain protective substances from their parents, their peers and their environment. When the bees were fed feces from hive bees, they immediately developed protective microflora. 

Simply feeding sugar syrup at times could hardly have such an effect. The colonies still have all the protective substances and systems functioning. Nobody doubts that honey and pollen are the best food for bees generally, but there types of honey and pollen that are poor food sources, and even harmful if consumed in large proportions. On the other hand, sugar syrup and pollen supplements tend to be clean, pure, and free from harmful substances. What they do not contain is microbiotic substances.

There has been support in the research community for the experimental use of probiotics, as the enhancement of the immune system in this or other ways may enable colonies to combat or endure stress more successfully. The importance of diet has been long known. In the early days of ocean exploration it was quickly discovered that humans cannot survive long without vitamin C, for example. Hence the provisioning of ships with limes, etc. 

Bees cannot live well on sugar syrup and pollen supplements, this has always been accepted. The best environment for bees is some garden of eden where they can get everything they need all the time. None of us has bees in such an environment and at times we have to act to compensate for shortcomings. Sugar syrup has long been used as a stimulant and life support for colonies, with no ill effects. 

What these researchers are interested in is the possibility that environmental contaminants can affect the balance between beneficial microflora and harmful parasites. In earlier work they showed that antibiotics can kill off the microflora, and the more recent study showed that by feeding bees feces from healthy bees their gut microflora could be restored. But the lesson is that bees are social creatures and receive far more than a warm bed and three square meals from the hive.

SEE
Socially transmitted gut microbiota protect bumble bees against an intestinal parasite
Hauke Koch1 and Paul Schmid-Hempel   PNAS | November 29, 2011 | vol. 108 | no. 48

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