Thanks Ghislain,

You appear to have attached the wrong link--instead attaching one for a
study by Mark Goodwin instead of one by Eva Frey (she's actually published
two studies documenting mite drift).

For a subject of this importance, there are surprisingly few studies
published.

The results of my own experiment so far are both counterintuitive and
surprising (and may help to explain Goodwin's conclusion that there was
scant drift between adjacent hives).  I'll wait until the experiment is
over before saying more.  But can confirm that there can be bee drift from
a collapsing hive for at least a mile (1.6 km) in forested land in the
California foothills.

It is surprisingly easy to collect such mite drift data.  When I write up
and publish my results, I'll offer a suggested protocol, and beg beekeepers
all over the country (and world) to join me in collecting hard mite drift
data next season.  Once we have hard data from many areas, we can discuss
this in a more informed manner.

 'Til then, suffice it to say that there is existing published data that
substantial mite immigration occurs in areas in which all known managed
hives had been treated, and no known managed hives collapsed (Greatti
1992).  This is also what I appeared to observe last season.  My hard data
to date this season supports that hypothesis.

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

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