I made in interesting observation yesterday. I carelessly neglected to inspect a nuc colony making a new queen, which from memory, I thought it had a new queen. It was completely my fault that this colony got slimed out, possibly causing the remainder of the colony to abscond, or get killed while getting robbed of honey. I simply brought the hive home to deal with.
It had 7 frames in a 10 frame super. I have 2 small entrances, one each side with one blocked.
Upon inspecting the first frame, I was puzzled to find it still contained a lot of untouched honey, however very watery, which ran out as I removed it. The second frame, the same, as was 6 & 7. HOWEVER frames 3,4 & 5 had been robbed out, obviously by robber bees.
Why did robber bees rob frames 3,4 & 5, while ignoring 1,2,6 & 7?. The only explanation I can think of, is the exiting of beetle larvae through that one small entrance. It must have started during the night, leaving the slime, which is a bee repellant at the entrance, causing the bees to no longer want to rob the remaining frames of honey.
Something caused that honey to be very wet. Whether it was something the beetles did or the high humidity we’re experiencing at the moment, I don’t know.