> If they were near pine forests, the uncapped honey could be honeydew honey which can be deadly to bees.

Several people have mentioned honeydew as a possible source of autumn collapse, or winter kill

> Honeydew is a secretion from various aphids and is collected by bees from a great variety of trees, such as pines, cedars, limes, firs, oaks, willows and sycamores. The honeydew from lime (Tilia platyphylla) was found toxic to the bees even when highly diluted with water. Bees which had been fed on diluted solutions of this substance all died within eight hours, and their symptoms were similar to those which suffered paralysis by gathering honeydew from the trees. It was found that neither boiling, nor filtering, nor evaporation to dryness and subsequent solution and filtering removed the toxic substance from the lime honeydew.

Pryce‐Jones, John. "SOME PROBLEMS ASSOCIATED WITH NECTAR, POLLEN AND HONEY." Proceedings of the Linnean Society of London. Vol. 155. No. 2. Blackwell Publishing Ltd, 1944.

[note: Tilia is called variously: lime, basswood, linden, etc.]

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