<hive should be sized to fit the swarm using  solid boards>

I am not using top bar hives so putting in solid boards would not be the 
answer. By combining the two hives they had just about two full boxes. It 
was an experiment, they were bound to die if left alone and did they did 
with the combination, they just chose to not do it in the hive. That is what 
I found strange that they left the hive. I am sure your friend in Nigerian 
is not dealing with 3 feet of snow and days of 20 degrees so allot of what 
they do would not apply here..


<Mould indicates leaky hives.>

I did have any mold in these hives when I spoke of the mold it was dead 
hives (dead bees in globs) I was cleaning out last spring that mice had been 
in, it was a mess and it smelled.


<Where did the  package come from for goodness sake?>

The package bees came from a reliable source the problem was we put that 
hive at relatives home, first time gardener that want pollination on the ten 
foot square garden. They knew nothing about bees, they opened them 
constantly, ran a sprinkler watering the garden which did not touch the hive 
but went across their flight path. So it was not the poor bees fault, as I 
said it was a lousy location, can you imagine watering a garden when we 
where just about drowning here in the northeast, every day it did not rain 
they had that sprinkler on.

The second abscond there may have been something the hive like a snake, 
there is a big build up of propolis in a weird shape on the three of the 
frames that where down towards the bottom board. But I am not sure if that 
was the problem. I have saved every thing for the bee inspector to look at 
any way. He says this same thing has happened to a few others here but it 
was in December.

Karen 

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