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It seems  like mighty costly research to satisfy "curiosity".
1) I didn't say I wanted to do research on this, I asked if anyone knew of
any.

2) I had reasons for asking these questions:
     a) A commercial beekeeper reports that  - colonies brought inland from
CA right after almonds - so they'd arrive  back  home to cool/cold northern
state temps, do not really start  their seasonal population growth and major
drone production until some time  after they arrive back home.  These
colonies only occasionally  swarmed, did so at the expected time (mid-May through
end of June, early July at  latest), and swarming could be headed off by
splits, adding supers,  etc.

- colonies that went onto stone crops after almonds and stayed on the west
coast, arrived back home weeks later.  These came back into the  home state
with a large number of drones in the colonies.  By swarm season,  these
colonies had lots of drones.  The beekeeper assumes that many of  these drones
were OLDER (having been hatched from eggs in CA earlier in the  season due
to the warmer weather in CA) compared to the colonies brought home  earlier,
where weather delayed major drone production.  The colonies that  spent most
of the spring on the west coast, building large drone   populations, were
extremely prone to swarming and splitting, adding empty  supers, etc.
Nothing seemed to slow them down at all - they just  left.

So, he wants to know why those colonies are so much more likely to  swarm.
P.S.  He runs thousands of colonies, has from more than 20  years.  It's
not simply population size, or any easy to point to  issue.  He was told (by a
breeder, I think) that it was the   presence of so many older drones, that
the drones were a factor.

     b) The back to nature folks  and some of the  Top Bar hive books claim
drones affect, even regulate, all kinds of strange  things, such as
temperature regulation and air flow.

Comes up in our classes, over and over.

So,  its a matter to countering the misinformation - assuming  it  is
misinformation.  I have a hard time believing that drones do much of  anything
other than eating and  hanging out hoping  to get  lucky.

But, I'd like to know where these ideas are coming from other than
speculation.  So, I'm trying to avoid doing research to prove that much of  this is
just conjecture.  But, the drone  advocates are vocal and can  persuade
other beekeepers - much like the  Food  Grade Mineral Oil or  the Menthol Cough
Drop approaches  to varroa control.  Neither proved  out, but lots of folks
lost hives blindly  following  the  vocal  advocates; who never let the
absence of data slow them down.

Bee-L was formed to be an Informed Discussion - I'm asking  for
Information.

Jerry

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