# What killed them?



## JWPalmer (May 1, 2017)

How many frames look like the last one in this group? For geographical reference, are you in Leechburg, PA?


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## Akademee (Apr 5, 2020)

Is all that brown stuff on the bottom board leaked honey, or something worse?


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## Leechburgbees (Apr 18, 2020)

JWPalmer said:


> How many frames look like the last one in this group? For geographical reference, are you in Leechburg, PA?


about half of the frames in the brood box looked like that, if you zoom in theres multiple of those white spheres. The other half of the brood box had honey stored but it was covered in green mold. A few bees were too. Yes I'm in Leechburg PA.


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## Leechburgbees (Apr 18, 2020)

Akademee said:


> Is all that brown stuff on the bottom board leaked honey, or something worse?


Thankfully just leaked honey


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## squarepeg (Jul 9, 2010)

welcome to beesource.

is that how you found them on the first look coming out of winter?


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## bushpilot (May 14, 2017)

Was there a top entrance? Your bottom entrance was definately blocked with bees.


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## squarepeg (Jul 9, 2010)

bushpilot said:


> Was there a top entrance? Your bottom entrance was definately blocked with bees.


good point.


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## Leechburgbees (Apr 18, 2020)

squarepeg said:


> welcome to beesource.
> 
> is that how you found them on the first look coming out of winter?


It is thought I should note that there was about a 2 week spell in march where it got into the 80s and then dropped down into the teens. Could that have done something?


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## Leechburgbees (Apr 18, 2020)

bushpilot said:


> Was there a top entrance? Your bottom entrance was definately blocked with bees.


no not on that hive


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## squarepeg (Jul 9, 2010)

Leechburgbees said:


> It is thought I should note that there was about a 2 week spell in march where it got into the 80s and then dropped down into the teens. Could that have done something?


maybe, was there a lot of entrance activity on those warm days?

bushpilot reminded me of a loss i had last winter that looked a lot like that.

my bottom entrance had become clogged with dead bees and the screens i had over the upper vents had become completely closed with propolis.

if it got too cold for the bees to keep the entrance clear and the hive was pretty much air tight with no additional venting then suffocation could have been a factor.


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## bushpilot (May 14, 2017)

I'm going to say suffocation.


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## fieldsofnaturalhoney (Feb 29, 2012)

bushpilot said:


> I'm going to say suffocation.


Whaaat., not mites But, seriously why has no one asked about mite treatments:scratch:


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## beemandan (Dec 5, 2005)

fieldsofnaturalhoney said:


> Whaaat., not mites
> 
> 
> 
> ...


Mite collapse, in my experience, doesn’t look like a sudden, total collapse. 
I suspect starvation. That is just the way a starved hive fails.


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## squarepeg (Jul 9, 2010)

we could use more history and a better photo of that brood if it is brood.

what about it doesn't look like a sudden, total collapse dan?

mites were the first thought i had, but after having my share of mite collapses none of them looked like that. 

most of those presented with drastically dwindled populations and small clusters stuck on brood, sometimes with spotty capped brood that when removed with a tweezers exhibited signs of disease.


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## beemandan (Dec 5, 2005)

squarepeg said:


> what about it doesn't look like a sudden, total collapse dan?


I probably didn’t express myself very well.
My point was that a mite collapse doesn’t usually result in a sudden failure.
This DOES look sudden. Therefore…in my opinion…not mite driven. 
Starvation, on the other hand, looks just like this.


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## squarepeg (Jul 9, 2010)

ahh, i get your drift now. thanks for the clarification.


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## crofter (May 5, 2011)

The sticky board says not mites. I dont know what to make of the picture to the right; is is sugar crystals that the liquid has been sucked out of. Did the collapse come before spring brood up started? If afterward there should have been signs of a final cluster around brood that would indicate if they got locked on brood or if it appeared honey was far from the final cluster. More could be known if pictures of more frames just as they were removed. I see no signs of heater bees head first in cells.

There are similarities to what I saw after what I presume to have been suffocation. Bees just appear to have dropped with no signs of a final cluster. No mites in wash of dead bees. No upper or middle entrances. 75% of the stores untouched on double deep colonies that had all been active up until end of Feb. Went into winter with next to zero mites. Totally snow and iced in for approx three days and zero upper entrance. First such trial of this concept.

Msl sent me a link connecting nosema surge after treatments with Oxy Tet. That it predisposes a susceptibility due to changes in gut biota. I had treated in the season previous for the EFB outbreak I had but it had cleared entirely and has seen no return.

There is not a huge amount of info on the web about suffocation.

Edit; I was surprised to see no signs of a cluster. Definitely not starved as colonies had gone into winter at 125 lbs gross or better and still had maybe 75% of stores left. In the opening post here the pictures do show frames with a large area of empty cells. More guesses on what is in the one on the right?


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## Leechburgbees (Apr 18, 2020)

squarepeg said:


> we could use more history and a better photo of that brood if it is brood.
> 
> what about it doesn't look like a sudden, total collapse dan?
> 
> ...


Alright so here are some more photos of frames, 1st 2nd 3rd pics are of the brood nest. 4th pic is of what the honey stores almost all looked like Also if it was starvation wold it be possible to clean off the frames and reuse them?


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## squarepeg (Jul 9, 2010)

more clues.

photo #3 is a well focused close up of spotty capped brood with perforations in the cappings. take a tweezers and pull some of those pupae out and look for stunted abdomens and deformed or missing wings.

i still can't make out what the white stuff is in photo #1. as frank has suggested, it may be crystalized honey or syrup. try to get a good clear close up of the white stuff like you did in photo #3.

did you treat for mites last fall?


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## crofter (May 5, 2011)

Most of the capped brood had perforated cappings. That could relate to mites or EFB. Many of the cells have been cleaned and repolished; see the dark circles in corners of cell bottoms. Have those cells had brood emerge once or would they only have had aborted larvae cleaned out. I saw similar during the EFB infection but that is much easier to detect when active rather than after collapse. The ones I looked at were in the summer and pre collapse.


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## Leechburgbees (Apr 18, 2020)

Photo 1 up close and in focus that's the white stuff. I don't know what it is but the brood nest is full of it


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## squarepeg (Jul 9, 2010)

the white stuff appears crystalized sugar sharing the cells with liquid feed. 

sometimes it's hard to say what killed them after the fact by looking at pictures on the internet. sometimes it's a combination of things or a sequence of events that leads to a colony collapsing.

if i had to say i would guess the colony was weakened by mites and/or a failing queen. the last bitter cold snap caused the death of the older and perhaps mite weakened bees.

it was too cold for the colony to remove the dead bees from the hive and they piled up at the entrance thereby reducing air flow in the hive. as more bees died more air was restricted killing more bees which in turn restricted more air flow ect.

in the end it appears suffocation did them in, especially if there were no upper entrances or vents, but it was likely mites and/or a failing queen that started the process. 

was this your first or one of your first hives?

did you feed syrup last fall to help get them ready for winter?

did you see bees flying in and out and bringing in pollen during the 80's warm up prior to the bitter cold snap?

did you check for and/or treat for mites last fall?

did you pull some of the capped brood out and check for deformities?

was this a commercially produced package of bees to start with?


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## Leechburgbees (Apr 18, 2020)

So this was one of of my first hives not my only one though the other two are fine but there were somewhat active before the big cold snap after a week a warmth in march. But if it was suffication and mites could the frames be reused for other hives and what would the process be of cleaning them also they were a package from mann lake. I pulled some larve out here's a picture (White stuff is sawdust)


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## squarepeg (Jul 9, 2010)

the bee in that picture appears to have a stunted abdomen and deformed wings suggesting mite vectored viruses were involved.

if you are sure there was no foulbrood then the frames can be used for other hives.


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## MJC417 (Jul 26, 2008)

Do a wash on a cup of dead bees and count the mites. It will help you determine cause of the dead out.


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## mila84 (Apr 28, 2019)

Unfortunately due to the current pandemic, this service is on hold but in normal circumstances I would recommend submitting your collapsed hive samples to Beltsville Agricultural Research Center's Bee Research Laboratory. You can find the info at https://www.ars.usda.gov/northeast-...search-laboratory/docs/how-to-submit-samples/. Maybe you can take the samples and save them in the freezer until they lift the block on their services? (Not sure...) The service is free and if it's disease related, they will confirm it for you. It's good to rule out starvation, suffocation or moisture/freezing causes before sending it in though.


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## rkereid (Dec 20, 2009)

Leechburgbees said:


> So one of my hives didnt make it through the winter (pictures linked below) heres the facts:
> The upper box was completely filled with honey
> The bottom board was covered in bees
> Mold looks common
> ...


Could easily have been virus from a high mite load during cold (non flying weather). During milder flying weather, they fly out and don't come back. Obviously, it makes sense to do a mite wash on the dead bees, and/or test for nosema, though I see no particular evidence of the latter.


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## jim lyon (Feb 19, 2006)

Dead bees on the bottom board suggests only 3 real possibilities, at least from my personal experience. #1 (most probable) starvation. #2 Mite vectored virus, though I have never experienced it in the spring #3 Poisoning, sounds unlikely given the facts here.


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## beemandan (Dec 5, 2005)

jim lyon said:


> Dead bees on the bottom board suggests only 3 real possibilities, at least from my personal experience. #1 (most probable) starvation. #2 Mite vectored virus, though I have never experienced it in the spring #3 Poisoning, sounds unlikely given the facts here.


Pretty much my thinking. Number 2 I have never seen anything that I could identify as a mite driven collapse that resulted in such a huge and sudden drop onto the bottom. Number 3, in my limited experience, either there are as many bees on the ground in front of the hive or if the pesticide is especially toxic, the foragers simply fail to return.
I still am voting for starvation......


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## squarepeg (Jul 9, 2010)

beemandan said:


> I still am voting for starvation......


many thanks jim and dan for contributing your experience-formed opinions.

do you think the white stuff in the photos is mixed crystalized/liquid feed and where the cluster was most likely located prior to collapse?

if yes and yes, wouldn't that tend suggest against starvation?


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## hickdriller (Apr 27, 2016)

To rule out mite u can look down in the brood cells for white specs . Mite droppings. Work good in the dark with a uv light.


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## beemandan (Dec 5, 2005)

squarepeg said:


> if yes and yes, wouldn't that tend suggest against starvation?


I have no idea what the white stuff is. It may be crystallized syrup honey but I don’t see why that would eliminate starvation.
In all honesty, I haven’t seen any photos of the brood nest proper. Maybe I just missed them. I don’t see anything in the posted photos that indicate where the cluster may have been at the time of the collapse.


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## crofter (May 5, 2011)

I certainly have not autopsied a lot of colonies. Not seeing signs of the colonies "last stand" seems strange though. I have seen such signs where the colony got locked on brood and I assume stayed till they used up their bodies supply of energy and then died of cold. Would that look different than a colony really empty of honey. How different would it look if there was or was not brood present.

I dont know whether the dead bees in the pics were gathered up and spread out on that bottom board or that is how they fell. There would have been clues available as the hive was pulled apart that are lost to us.

The colonies of mine that I thought might have suffocated had the bees quite spread out, not as I would picture them having fallen from a cluster. Analogy that came to mind was them searching every corner for an air hole till they collapsed. Completely conjecture though.


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## squarepeg (Jul 9, 2010)

understood all. it's very difficult to be definitive after the fact and without all the context.


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## beemandan (Dec 5, 2005)

At the risk of beating the starvation drum once again, if there weren’t any brood I would expect to find a lot of bees headfirst into empty comb. If they got caught incubating brood in a protracted cold spell, I would expect to see a brood frame with a relatively good sized area of capped brood. What I didn’t see in any of the photos was a picture of a brood frame. Zip.
Without that photo….I am just speculating.


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## squarepeg (Jul 9, 2010)

i'm with you on that dan.

perhaps someone smarter than i would consider developing a post mortum questionnaire that we could sticky thread at the top.

if when posting a thread like this one the op would take a few moments to answer the pertinent questions i believe they would get a faster and more meaningful answer.

i would give it shot, but i'm a little preoccupied at the moment trying like heck to get everything in order to reopen my small business on may 1.


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## crofter (May 5, 2011)

I was stuck on there being no brood but if they were starving that would account for it. I would think that in PA. there should be brood in a healthy hive by that point. The queen may have bit the bullet earlier in the winter, so that too clouds the matter.


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## jim lyon (Feb 19, 2006)

beemandan said:


> At the risk of beating the starvation drum once again, if there weren’t any brood I would expect to find a lot of bees headfirst into empty comb. If they got caught incubating brood in a protracted cold spell, I would expect to see a brood frame with a relatively good sized area of capped brood. What I didn’t see in any of the photos was a picture of a brood frame. Zip.
> Without that photo….I am just speculating.


Agreed. I have seen virus kills like this a few times that look a bit like this but only in the fall and there is usually still a small residual population. That’s not to be confused with the far more common mite collapses which we have all experienced late in the season. Yes, you are also quite correct on your pesticide description. Usually dead bees both in the hive and in the entrance with, again, a small residual population of survivors.


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