Jim:

Thanks for pondering an excellent observation.  

According to my limited observation, of having done nothing but walk-away
splits, in order to keep my survival /local stock without any treatment
intact, the later into the season, the higher the failure rate.  And again
according my unreliable intuition, the queen failure seems to coincide with
the return of migrating birds, such as barn martins, among others.  

Earlier splits I make, typically around the first week of March in my neck
of the woods, seem to do well probably since the migratory birds/dragonflies
are not present in the mating areas; however, fall splits and the mid-way
(during flow) supercedure queens seem to show higher rate of queen failure.  

Invariably, a healthy colony can and will go queenless especially in the
thick of nectar flow, a very inconvenient time to share brood frames from
others.  If you run a good number of colonies, or stay too busy to pay
attention to individual hives, it is rather difficult to locate the
queenless colonies till it is too late.  My memory tells me, I sure hope I
err here, the queenless colony can be as high as 13%.  Please feel free to
correct my faulty memory.

Yoon

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