Hello Mike,

Mike said:
Cant imagine just loading them out without checking the strength
first.

When hives have been fed heavily in the north in early fall many times the
cluster is NOT in the top box. Lifting the lid does not help in checking
those hives you have to dig deeper. On a day like today (zero outside ) you
do not want to break the seal on the hives and ship as the boxes will not
reseal like they do in warm weather and will shift in transport (kind of
like a load of old dry not used for a long time supers).

Calls for hives do go out (and will) around this time for bees for Almond
pollination. The broker has no risk in the situation. All risk is born by
the beekeeper. Reason for the advice I gave to Allen. All beekeepers do the
best they can getting ready for severe winter and then CROSS THEIR FINGERS.
Hard to guess whats going on in Northern hives you have not looked into in
months.

Mike said:
Anyway,Tmites must still be considered and dealt with.

I would have liked to have said the above in the last T mite discussion on
BEe-L but what does a lowly beekeeper know. I have got friends in the south
which fight T mites all the time but yet T mites are not a serious problem
in the south as stated by researchers on BEE-L(or are they?).

Bob