>One of the most important factors must be the density of colonies in the
apiary/nearby.  Apart from the beekeeper, the worst enemy of a colony of
bees is another one!

Density, entrance direction, and landmarks affect the drift of bees from
hive to hive.  But simple drift would not be expected to cause a sudden
massive spike in the mite count of any individual hive.

Futhermore, I often observe that in my colonies set in pairs, entrances
facing the same direction, that one may have a sky-high mite count, while
the one next to it may be close to zero.

Simple hive-to-hive drift would be expected to follow the math of
diffusion, and not create sudden spikes.

If one is not taking weekly or monthly mite wash counts from the same
hives, it's difficult to observe trends.

-- 
Randy Oliver
Grass Valley, CA
www.ScientificBeekeeping.com

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