One of the people who reads my blog, Elise, submitted this comment on my last post and I think it's important to share with everyone else:
"...I wondered if you're using high-fructose corn syrup as bee bait? I'm guessing not, but I just wanted to check, as I was a little concerned given studies that show a potentially harmful substance may form in high-fructose corn syrup that may contribute to honey bee deaths and colony collapse disorder (I use local, raw, unprocessed honey myself when baiting bees). For more info on HFCS and HMF see this article"
So there you have it -corn syrup as an attractant is a no no. Since the majority of the commercial beekeepers I talk to say that the quantities that I use as bait are too small to cause problems I'm going to go back to using honey.
6 comments:
Wow, you can never really estimate the results of our actions. Mind you, as your quantities are quite small, I'm thinking that you are correct in that you haven't caused harm.
Wow, one can't always foresee the results of our actions. Although in this case I think you and the bees are okay but, man . . . there is just so much to consider, especially if you throw in my level of ignorance.
Not that I got around to baiting anything this year but thanks for the info.
I always wondered about the possible toxity of human pharmaceuticals or processed food to insects. Have experienced the ones here appreciate lot more pure honey than (sugar+honey) products. Even wild lemons are more popular among them than the ones I bought in supermarket.
Also goes to show how little we k ow about the world around us ;)
On the flip side, one needs to be sure to use clean honey as it can carry thing like AFB spores, that are not harmful to humans but can be deadly to the bees.
True HB, but in the quantities that the average macro shooter uses as bait AFB shouldn't be a problem.
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