>The experts were not expecting, or looking, for disease;

Any "expert" does not need to "look" for disease--it would jump out at him
with even a cursory handling of combs.

>That is why you have to train yourself to look for problems every time that

> you open a hive.  There are those who just look - and those who look and
> see.
>

What I've noticed when I give trainings is that most beekeepers are
distracted by all the bees on the combs.  It's like looking for the queen.
A beginning beekeeper needs to decide, one at a time, whether each bee on
the comb is a queen or not.  The experienced beekeeper ignores all the
workers and drones, and only focuses on his search image for a queen.

Ditto for signs of disease.  What one learns is to ignore "normal," and to
be aware of the anomaly.  The anomalies are what then lead to you look more
closely to see what caused them.

-- 
Randy Oliver
Grass Valley, CA
www.ScientificBeekeeping.com

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