Did a cutout underneath a trailer this past week.  One thing I observed were that in all the drone brood that was exposed, there were no, I REPEAT - NO, varroa.  This was the biggest colony that I've had the experience to cut out.  We filled two hive bodies with tied in comb. We're going to see if we got the queen by going back into the hives in about a week and look for eggs.  If we spot the eggs, we're going to leave them alone for a couple more weeks.  I'm hoping that if one or both of the hives don't have the queen, that they will draw out queen cells from the eggs and brood that was tied in.  We'll separate the combs with queen cells and try to construct nucs with them.  All the time, I plan to continue to watch the drone brood for the presence of mites.  It really struck me strongly that with all the drone comb that was exposed, not one mite was found.  Will keep you updated.

Mike in LA
1/2 half way between Montgomery, Mobile, and Pensacola.



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