> I'm quite familiar with absconding in nucleus colonies. The cluster leaves with the queen, only a few bees left with lots of healthy brood.

>The description to me sounded like robbing, especially hive 1 with the dead bees and ragged combs.

We actually had a queen-finishing nuc do exactly this last week,
however the situation I'm describing involved full hives with two hive
bodies worth of bees.  Both left spotty brood which had "popped up"
through cappings.  The symptoms don't line up with anything I know,
but the inspector will be out to take a look and rule out brood
disease.

One hive was definitely robbed but it is unclear whether robbing
occurred before or after the departure of the bulk of the colony.  The
second hive shows very little sign of robbing but otherwise looks
identical.

I have three more hives of this design within 10 miles, and all three
are doing well and bursting with bees, though two will likely need
feeding as this dearth continues.

This horizontal hive design overwinters and builds up extremely well.
But one of the kinks I'm working out is that they have a LOT of
ventilation during the summer.  That may have reduced their ability to
cool in record-breaking temps, but I don't know what absconding caused
by heat would look like.  That's why I'm hoping someone here has seen
a colony abscond due to overheating, so that I can rule in or out the
hive design itself as a contributing factor.

Catherine

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