Dextrose 25kg

01 · WHY DEXTROSE AND NOT ICING SUGAR

The difference is in what it does not contain

They look alike and are not alike. Commercial icing sugar nearly always carries an anti-caking agent — usually starch — so it does not set in the bag: an addition the bee does not digest and which ends up as filler in a patty. This dextrose is crystallised D-glucose with a spec purity above 99.5 % on dry matter and a maximum moisture of 9.1 %, and nothing else. Glucose is also the sugar the bee takes up most directly, with nothing to split first.

02 · WHAT PART IT PLAYS IN A MIX

It gives body and raises solids; it does not remove water

It is a technical nuance that saves a lot of ruined paste: the powder does not “absorb” water from the mix; what it does is increase the proportion of solids and with it change the texture. In a typical protein patty the base is inverted syrup, the protein fraction is soy flour, and dextrose takes up roughly a quarter of the mix, giving body and energy. Weigh every ingredient and follow a tested formulation: adding dextrose by eye leaves a paste too hard, which the colony works through slowly or simply leaves.

03 · WHAT IT IS AND IS NOT

An energy ingredient, not a complete diet

It supplies glucose and 3,640 kcal/kg of gross energy, and that is where it ends: it covers no protein, fats, vitamins or minerals. Before formulating, be clear what you are after — maintaining stores, achieving a particular texture, or energy support inside a wider diet — and match the amount to stores, colony strength, temperature and purpose. Plus one management rule that has nothing to do with the product: do not feed during a commercial flow or with supers on for harvest, because what you give ends up stored and alters the honey.

04 · BEFORE YOU BUY

It is classified as a feed raw material and sold for preparing bee feed. Keep the container closed and dry, use clean utensils and close it again as soon as you measure: it is hygroscopic and cakes with ambient moisture. This format is the 25 kg industrial sack exactly as it leaves the plant, so the batch and date on the sack itself are what govern. If you need less at a time, there is the repacked 5 kg.