> >I don't think I understand what your trying to say there???  Could you
> elaborate???
>

The drift of mites from collapsing colonies has been carefully measured by
a number of researchers.  It can be up to 1500 mites over a relatively
short period of time.  "Normal" figures are of course lower.

One can likely assume that the amount of immigration would be a function of
the number of collapsing colonies, the number of mites in those colonies,
the number of robbing colonies, etc.

If you have a lot of hives in an area, and few collapsing, then likely you
won't see a great amount of immigration.  On the other hand, many of us
have seen our colonies being completely overwhelmed.
-- 
Randy Oliver
Grass Valley, CA
www.ScientificBeekeeping.com

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