The Bees - Hive Collapse

Hive Collapse

I went out to check the hive yesterday before the storm.   My husband had said that there wasn't any activity that he could see from the outside on a warm day last week.  I opened the viewing window and used a flashlight.  We have lost all our bees.  There don't seem to be any dead bees: just an empty hive.  It is spotlessly tidy and there is still honey.  We are very sad.  It's hard to explain an emotional tie to insects, if you have never kept bees.  But they are like part of the family, in a strange way. 

We will have to figure out what happened before we get new bees.  I'm afraid that the swarm we brought in from Eldorado Canyon last summer brought some kind of contagion.  Our neighbors sprayed for weeds, but not for insects, as far as I know.  If there is a contagion, we will have to burn the hives and start over.  I'm not exactly sure what the next step is.  We have wheat fields all around us and I suppose those fields probably use one of those Monsanto products that kills everything.  And GMO seed.  If anyone out there has a suggestion, I'm open.

The front door to the hive was all properly winterized by the bees as usual.  It is a puzzle.