> Yes my bees really have ccd, read archives and save my
> temper.
>  There are only 30 posts re ccd from me (2007-2008)

Hello Dave,

Just because you had ccd in the past doesn’t mean you have it now.  Researchers have stated that ccd has been known to disappear without a trace. So there is an ‘out’ if your looking for one.

What is nice about diagnosing ccd, is when you can’t figure out the cause, you can blame it on ccd.  It gives comfort to a beekeeper by giving them a ‘name’ to the undetermined cause of the problem.  One of the symptoms of ccd is that when beekeepers are convinced they have ccd, they rarely will accept OR consider any  suggestion that there may be another cause.

So if you say your bees have ccd I will concede. 

> (when infection jumps, so does brood mortality)
> Is this what causes collapse or
> original infection?

If you think you might wish to consider that it may perhaps have been varroa / DVW related,  typically, a colony will tend to dwindle in population and crash during the fall.  The inability of the colony to tend brood and keep it warm during this time will cause a brood mortality known as ’chilled brood’.  But if you wish not to consider this, then we can still call it ccd, as symptoms prescribed to ccd colonies are so ambiguous, that almost any bee malady can be attributed to it.

Best Wishes,
Joe


      

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