Topping up with sugar syrup?

I saw a thread similar to this the other day but it didn't quite have the answer. I made a strawberry wine about a month and am going to be putting it into tertiary. There is a lot of lees in the bottom and am going to be about half a gallon shy of a full carboy. I'm not worried about losing flavor/color because I used 25lbs. of strawberries for 5 gal. It's at 12% alc/vol. and I don't want to lose that by topping off with straight water. If I made a sugar mixture and racked on to that:
1.Should there be enough yeast to start again? - should only raise the whole by maybe 10 points or so.
2.Shouldn't leave nearly as many lees as there are now? - won't have all the peices and parts of the strawberries.

Am I right in assuming these or am I missing something. Thanks in advance.

The answer to both questions is "maybe". Maybe the yeast are still able to restart fermentation, depending on the yeast strain and the health of the yeast. If it's a champagne yeast, which will ferment up to 18% or more, it should go if the yeast are not too pooped out. It also might not restart, leaving you with a sweetened wine.

If fermentation restarts, you'll have more lees to deal with, but not as much as with the strawberries still in there. You still might have a lot, though, and will have to rerack when fermentation stops again. (Which then may mean you want to top up). You may want to just consider racking to a smaller carboy, and then not have to top up. I always have a wine bottle with a stopper and airlock with the "extras" for topping up. You can also use sanitized marbles to reduce headspace, if it isn't alot.

I think that I'm going to rack it and see where I am at after that. I wish that I had a 3 gallon carboy but I don't. If there isn't too much headspace I'll just use water and if there is a lot I'll use the sugar water. If I do use the sugar water route then I will be sure to post how that works out here for anyone else that might need to do this in the future. Thanks Yooper for the quick response.

Nevermind the amount of lees in the bottom was very decieving. After racking it the carboy was filled up to a level that is fine. Maybe next time I'll rack it first before i worry about things that I don't have to do.

Darn!!! I was looking forward to hearing how it worked out!