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Informed Discussion of Beekeeping Issues and Bee Biology

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Subject:
From:
James Fischer <[log in to unmask]>
Reply To:
Informed Discussion of Beekeeping Issues and Bee Biology <[log in to unmask]>
Date:
Tue, 18 Jul 2017 18:41:57 -0400
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> Is there any way to tell what flowers HONEY comes from...

I doubt this would be a panacea for all applications, but the ratio of
sucrose, fructose, and glucose will vary with species of flower.  The most
extreme example I can think of would be orange blossom honey, which will be
at the high end of the glucose percentage range.

Now, if we take the spectrum of (assumed to be overlapping) sugar ratios,
and map time on a z axis, we can separate out what blooms when, and
eliminate some of the overlap.  Yet a 4th axis could denote location/region,
as, for example, orange trees would not found in NYC outside of orangeries,
and can be ruled out unless one is the botanical garden beekeeper (and may
God have mercy on her soul if she attempts to figure out what nectar is
coming in, from the hundreds of possible sources she has!)

But I would want to test incoming nectar from individual bees, rather than
letting the nectar be mixed with forage from other nectar sources, as bees
always hedge their bets, and try to work at least two sources at all times.
Seeley gets poetic about this in "Wisdom of The Hive".  I cannot imagine
this approach to nectar sampling ending well for the forager, but "in the
interest of science" seems often hard on the bees unlucky enough to be
participating.

This is all speculation, I have no experience in testing sugars, I do not
even know how accurate one can be, but people have been talking about
"counting carbs" for such a long time, I assume that someone is good at it
by now.  :)

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