Sugar Syrup and Vinegar, Is White Vinegar OK?

[Joe]

Usually when making sugar syrup I add a little Cider Vinegar as was recommended to me by some more experienced beekeepers.  My girlfriend was trying to be nice and made some syrup for me, but instead of using Cider Vinegar she used White Vinegar.  Is White Vinegar safe for honeybees?

[Dick Allen]

probably generally ok, but vinegar (and cream of tartar) was reported by researcher and author Leslie Bailey in 'Honey Bee Pathology' a couple of decades ago to shorten the lives of honey bees.  In a good strong colony building up, that probably goes unnoticed by the beekeeper.

[Brian D. Bray]

White vinegar used to be labeled as distilled vinegar, and still may be in certain areas.  It should harm nothing.  I like the cider vinegar because of the organic components of the cider give some essential elements that distilling removes.  

I have never heard of cider vinegar shortening the lives of honey bees in the nearly 50 years I've been keeping bees.

[KONASDAD]

Richard Bonney says in his Hive Management text that cream of tartar shortens bee's life, and he advises adding cider to sugar as a preservative. Does not indicate which type of vinegar.

[Joe]

I appreciate all of the replies, I'm going to go ahead and use it, I hate to waste 20 pounds of sugar.  I have never heard that cream of tartar reduces the life span of bees.. I'll research that a bit for sure now that I know.

[Dick Allen]

>I have never heard of cider vinegar shortening the lives of honey bees in the nearly 50 years I've been keeping bees.

It looks as though you just now heard it.  :lol:
As posted earlier, it's mentioned in Bailey's 'Honey Bee Pathology' and, as I also posted, it probably goes unnoticed by beekeepers with strong colonies

[Finsky]

It is unnecessary to manipulate sugar syrup for bees. I feed my bees with normal sugar syrup and bees live with it from September to end of May. It is 9 months.

[Mici]

many beekeepers cook "tea" for bees. for instance, tea from origano and tyhme is proven to help against chalk brood. and many beekeepers claim that it improves bees selfcleaning awareness

[Finsky]

tea from origano and tyhme is proven to help against chalk brood.

I have read researches from chalk brood and I have noticed this before. It is said that no medicin affects against chalk brood.

[Mici]

Heard that before. I have big problems with chalk brood. first two hives i had, had chalk brood, they looked really poor, so i fed them a couple of times with tea and one hive is looking great, almost no chalk brood at all, i could say that it's cured. Then i got 3 more hives, they were swarms exactly, and 1 also had chalk brood. so 3 out of 5 had chalk brood. Someone told me to spray or feed the bees with apple vinegar, well i can say the bees aren't very keen about eating vinegar but the new hive got cured. so now i have only 1 hive with serious chalk brood problems, i've sprayed them with vinegar, so the next week i should see the results. I also bought some powder againts chalk brood, so i'm not very sure what helped 1 hive, either the powder or the vinegar treatment...

others say requeening is the only solution, others say that it ain't...

i've heard all the treatments and started with the cheapest :P , it helped, you go try you're luck.

[Finsky]

I have had bad chalkbrood problems 15 years and my opinion is that when you change the queen you get rid off disease - propably.

If you cure hive at start of summer when nights become warm, cure seems to help because they will do that without cure.  Chalkbrood is so vastly spread disease that if you cure helps it would be surely tried in every country.

Last summer I killed all queens which showed weaknes with chalk brood. This year situation was better than before. I killed that for 50% of my new queens.

Here is an interesting research
http://www.scielo.br/scielo.php?script=sci_arttext&pid=S0073-47212001000200016


.

[Mici]

well, what can i say, i remain at my type of treatment: first try the cheapest and gradualy invest more money. i mean really, why would i lie, in one hive, tea really made a difference, in the other was the vinegar, the third (not treated with tea) remains to be inspected. if it won't help, i'll requeen the next year.

i've talked to many about this, and really, one said: APPLE VINEGAR is 100%, the other one- I use only thyme tea and have no chalk brood, the third said: there is no help, the fourth said, requeening is the only solution.

[Dick Allen]

As the bee population builds up in a hive, the problems with chalkbrood often disappear since there are more bees to clean the infected mummies from the cells. If you had chalkbrood and fed vinegar and the symptoms disappeared can you say with certainty that it was the vinegar that cured it. Would it have disappeared anyway with a build-up of population.

I did have one hive earlier this year with significant chalkbrood. It was bad enough that the hive did not build up as fast as others. It was requeened and the problem has disappeared.

Some beekeepers love to add all sorts of concoctions, elixers, and potions to their hives thinking they are helping the bees. Generally, if the bees are healthy to begin with they don't need all that stuff. Try, sometime, feeding half your bees with whatever you give them and half without. I'd bet at seasons end you would not notice any difference.

[Finsky]

My problems with chalkbrood begun when I started feed pollen in spring. Bees accelerated their brood area and in cold weather they could not keep brood warm.  Chalk brood bursted and cells contaminated. When it come good summer weathers disease disapered. If it was rainy two weeks it come again.

When I noticed chalk brood next spring I closed all upper entrances. 90% of mummies disaperared.

If hive's brood die 20% hive cannot gather surplus honey.

There are a lot scientific researches from chalk brood and their tell same story.  Very strange but chalk brood noticed in Australia 1998.  At same time is spread in South Africa with varroa.

[Mici]

I agree with you, but it's still interesting that it kinda speeds up the process. if you think a little. thyme and origano are proven to help, and vinegar..vinegar is acid, right? chalk brood is infected with fungus, right? I think i don't have to point out that acids are bad for fungus, really bad 8)

in my opinion, there are two types of chalk brood.
1) the family has inherited the weakness against it, and so can not be helped without requeening. not vinegar nor abrakadabra powders won't help
2) the family got stressed (by moving for instance) and is temporeraly affected by chalk brood, vinegar and other potions will help them with overcoming the situation.

[Finsky]

It is not so easy. Beekeepers are so fool that they try everything what they get in their head.

My mother was that opinion that horseradish helps in everything.

.

[Mici]

It is not so easy. Beekeepers are so fool that they try everything what they get in their head.
.

Just couldn't be more true :)

My mother was that opinion that horseradish helps in everything..

Heh


i admit, my suggestions and believes could be completely wrong and unfunctiona.