POTENTIAL USE OF THE 3 FREQUENTLY OCCURRING SUGARS IN HONEY TO PREDICT STINGLESS BEE ENTOMOLOGICAL ORIGIN

Stingless bee honeys were extracted from 27 nests in the West and Sout h of Venezuela and analysed by HPLC for sugar content. The concentrati on and ratios of the three frequently occurring sugars, fructose, gluc ose and maltose, were related to the entomological origin of the sampl es. The Fact that an unusual high maltose content was characteristic f or Trigonini honeys was further explored to propose its use as a predi ctor of entomological origin. A dendrogram with normalized values of m altose was successfully used to cluster honeys of the same stingless b ee tribe, except for Scaptotrigona spp. Three maltose ratios were calc ulated and all of them were distinctive for Meliponini, Trigonini and the intermediate Scaptotrigona spp, honeys. The hexoses-to-maltose rat io is the proposed predictor because differences at the tribe level ar e easily observed without further statistical analysis; in the present set of honeys, Scaptotrigona spp. presented values between 11 and 12, other Trigonini were lower than 3 and Meliponini were higher than 15.