In answer to Pete's question, I've been looking pretty deeply into this for
some time, and am well aware of Jerry's data as well as that of Eva Frey.
I have trouble believing that the amount of drift that Jerry speaks of
would account for number of mites that appear to immigrate into some
hives.  And Frey's data has long made me question the collapse/robbing
scenario.  But based upon the hard numbers of mite immigration found in the
few other studies that I've seen, as well as my calculated estimates based
upon my own data, I feel that we need to confirm Frey's suggestion that few
mites successfully disperse via robbing and drift, especially in light of
Seeley's findings.  He currently has a collaborator tallying up a new data
set that should help to answer the question.

If there are volunteers, especially any in isolate areas, there are a
couple of simple experiments we could do.  One is to count immigrating
mites, as I've already outlined.

The other is to track the number of drifted bees from collapsing hives,
either by using colonies of different colors of bees, or by spray painting
the bees.

Anyone looking for a good project, please let me know!

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

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