I had the following buried in the commercial/hobby beekeeper thread and
moved it here for comment-

What if we are paying too much attention to mite buildup in the fall when
our real problem is virulent bees? As I noted in my response to Randy on
mite buildup, bees are more than capable of spreading disease all by
themselves. Plus, they are much more efficient at it. So the BPV and PMS I
saw so early after robbing/immigration was probably caused by infected bees
as well as being the infected bees, and the additional mites were an issue
but not the main one.That makes perfect sense and easily explains why we
get sudden collapse. It also would pin the tail more on bees from away
rather that a strong hive bring back virulent mites from a robbed
collapsing hive.

Mites would eventually take their toll, but my guess it is the bees that
cause the quick collapse. The collapse from mites would come, but later.

Could the robbed honey also play a part? Not sure about that since not sure
if virus survive in all that sugar.

So is it the bees from away that cause the sudden collapse? Would not take
many, especially in the Fall. My guess, based on the mite drop I had was
about 300 new bees which would be clustered tightly with the healthy bees
becasue of Autumn temperatures. Classic way to quickly spread disease.

Bill Truesdell
Bath, Maine

             ***********************************************
The BEE-L mailing list is powered by L-Soft's renowned
LISTSERV(R) list management software.  For more information, go to:
http://www.lsoft.com/LISTSERV-powered.html