This is an example of mixing up correlation with causation. More likely poor honey production and hive beetle infestation are the result of poor colony condition -- rather than beetles being the cause of poor honey production and poor colony condition.
Possibly, but I suspect that given the full story we see a different picture. first pulls on these yards were all about the same, its later season i see the drop, last pull being the worse.
If we are to assume SHB pressure is the same in every yard, I would say you have a very valid point, but thats not the case I see, What I see is yard to yard variations, not based on hive quality, but by infestations comeing from other sources. Fortunatly a weak hive does not mean the beetle level will rise. There is a lot more to the picture which I cannot define yet. I am not trying to deal with absolutes, but ground reality. and in this case since all infestations are not equaL, It is a bit difficult to seperate the two.
Without a doubt, the TOP honey producers in a infected yard are the main targets. Especially late season. Let me eloborate, late season production here means the bees need to be fadeing down and not building up, which skews the population dynamics and leaves more room for beetles. The wonderful catach 22.
But a very thoughtful and relevant observation to keep in mind.
Towards that I would like to address ET,s comment about come to TX, I suspect (correct if I am wrong please) that correlation not being causation is the reality I would be shown. Hives in full sun without problems, but unless they are next to hives with shade, its not the picture.
I have done full trials, shade and sun, for my area, in 2 different seasons. results are clear, and contrasting grom teh common knowledge ( which by the way I have no idea how got propigated as I find no paper on it)
https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/23451773
https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/24772531
here are 2 links showing quite clearly soil temp and moisture are huge factors in pupation and SEX of the emerging beetles. Follow that and you see that the link to full sun or shade is related to current soil temp and moisture. Some areas the sun will help reach perfect conditions (seems to be the case here in midwest) and in other areas the sun will push the soil out of optimum! as far as hive temps are concerned, its a non starter, beetles love hot hives and travel at night so its a moot point.
I make no claim that sun is bad, which is in contrast to those who tell you its the answer. The other one I see that drives me nuts is the queenless hive concept. In my area this is a falshood. As I mentined queenless tend to be more aggrasive and less food for beetles. so as a result a true queenless hive is NOT a target util the very end of it life. Two factors though will ensure this never gets corrected. first off, many hives the queen and most of the bees abscond befoer being noticed. Secondly any queenless hive that gets missed will at some point have nothing left but beetle forage. so as a result, by the time they are found they are in fact queenless. So it will contiue to propigate. frustrating for me, but its a tiny detail. Once we start looking close we see a differnt picture. These beetles are not the end of things, as many areas I suspect they will never be a big problem, but they do change the game a lot if your not prepared to deal differntly.
With beetles liveing 45-60 days, laying close to 1000 eggs each, pupation rates approaching 90, and 3/1 females soil conditions qre a critical factor in very quick (expotential) rises in popuations. makes varro at 1.4 seem like an easy task.
Charles
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