On 4-Mar-14, at 10:34 AM, randy oliver wrote:
>
> I know that it's a bit early in the season for many of you, but a  
> member of
> our local club brought in some dead drones from the front of a hive.

Hi Randy and all

This is different as mine occurred last September 14.  I found drone  
pupae, sometimes over 100 each, in front of half of my hives.  We had  
our first frost that morning (2-3 weeks early) and it had become  
obvious to me, and surely the bees, that our normal 2 week goldenrod  
flow would not occur in 2013(scale hive increases of over 10#/day  
started Sep 9 and finished Sep 10).  I have not seen this before or  
after.  I had bragged at our local Beek Assoc that I wouldn't need  
mite treatments, pending one more count, because of almost non- 
existent varroa levels all summer.  Treatment levels were reached on  
several of my hives when I checked sticky boards that week.  Did the  
bees detect high varroa and pull the pupae, I wonder?

Bob Darrell
Caledon Ontario
Canada
44N80W

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