That is it gist of it. The issue is that hives are showing up empty,
with perhaps a few newly emerged brood and sometimes an ill queen, and
automatically the assumption is that the rest of the bees died out there
somewhere. I'm saddened by the fact that a newbie like myself can see
what vastly more experienced beeks seem happy to ignore. We all know
that bees make new queens when their current queens weaken and slow down
in laying. A queen left in the hive therefore means nothing in regards
to the survival or not of the rest of the colony. Sick bees left over in
the hive is no indicator that the rest of the hive is likewise sick, but
an indicator of why the bees left in the first place. I've had fire-ants
drive off a hive before, with injured bees left behind. Survival of the
hive takes precedence over the remaining ill - bees don't concern
themselves with the individual, only the hive. So, an empty hive will
mean either that the bees have found a hole somewhere to colonized, or
if their numbers had reduced enough they moved in with a neighboring and
healthier hive. That, folks, is the story behind CCD. No one has found a
"cause" for the disorder because it's not a disorder - it's survival. So
while they're looking in all the wrong places, beekeepers are changing
nothing in their methods and they're continuing to lose hives left and
right. Those that do change their methods, however, after an initial
loss during the transition, experience growth while others are
experiencing decline. Dee Lusby is an example, as is Michael Bush and
there are many others.