Hi Chuck, Paul and Robin,

To follow up a little:
The bees appear to have fallen from the cluster over a very short period
of time, since they were all in the same condition.
I presume that the deaths occurred after the colonies were moved outside
- a distance of 50 metres.
Entrances are at the bottom of the brood box - reduced to 3cm* 1cm in
size. Only a few colonies show damp debris on the floor - the others are
just littered with the normal winter debris.

If the deaths were characteristic of all or most hives then I would
suspect inability to remove dead bees in general due to climatic or
other conditions. This is not the case.

Peter

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