Javin007, you are partly right, in my opinion. Varroa aren’t the only possible cause of a small overwintering cluster but……they are the most likely culprit.
In the early days of AIDS many patients died of pneumonia. The underlying reason was a compromised immune system that resulted from the AIDS virus. To say they simply died of pneumonia would be to dismiss the entirety of the epidemic. To ignore varroa as the likely causal agent of an undersized wintering bee cluster would be a similar dismissal.
And in my opinion, you couldn't be more wrong. Varroa would be a likely culprit if they actually had a weak cluster, or ANY sign of Varroa. Which they don't. Go back and look at the pictures posted by the original poster again. There was NO UNDERSIZED CLUSTER. There were THOUSANDS of dead bees that had fallen to the bottom of the hive. This... was... a... starvout... Yet you keep insisting it's Varroa with based on nothing more than that you think all starve-outs (or freeze-outs) are Varroa.
Javin007 – that have been used for the past 100 years by commercial bee keepers that have for the first time in history possibly put the entire race of both domestic and feral honey bees into serious jeopardy.
The introduction of an exotic parasite into the system of North American honey bees has absolutely nothing to do with the methods used by commercial beekeeping.
You just said that... Like... Out loud... Like you believe it.
Tracheal Mites - Discovered in 1919 on the Isle of Wight, laws passed in 1922 to prevent spread to the U.S. through COMMERCIAL bee keeping. On July 3, 1984, tracheal mites were first detected in the United States from bees sampled from a COMMERCIAL beekeeping operation in Weslaco, Texas.
Varroa Destructor - First found on imported European honeybees in Hong Kong and Singapore in 1963, it was specifically BECAUSE of the COMMERCIAL bee keeping industry that it rapidly spread. By 1970 it was found in South America, and in 1975, Akratanakul and Burgett published a warning about the threat posed by Varroa mites. In spite of the threat, no change was made to COMMERCIAL beekeeping methods, and bees continued to be shipped to the U.S. from known infected countries. A single mite was discovered in Maryland in 1979; however, no more were seen in the U.S. until populations were discovered in Wisconsin and Florida in 1987, all indicators that they came in commercial bee packages rather than a natural spread from South America.
Small Hive Beetle - Originally endemic to Africa, the beetle was first discovered in the United states in 1996, though they were first confirmed in the southeastern United States in 1998 in a COMMERCIAL apiary in Florida. It is believed by the scientific community that the rapid spread of the beetle from Florida to the rest of the United States is due to migratory (commercial) bee keepers.
Shall I continue? Nearly every parasitic and disease problem facing not only the commercial, but the wild honey bees in the world is in some way related to poor business practices of the commercial bee keepers over the past many years. It's an
ugly fact, but it's also still a fact. Yes, they're facing additional problems from other commercial agriculture as well now (eg: the pesticides used on monoculture crops) but the finger cannot be solely pointed at outside of the circle. We decided to muck about with nature for our OWN profit, forcing bees to change the size of their cells, dumping antibiotics and miticides on them so we could save a few dollars instead of allowing nature to do it's thing, and importing bees from whoever had the ones that could make us the most money at the time resulting in ALL bees having ALL problems simultaneously.
If you choose to deny that any of this is a problem, then in your words, "fine. I don't. Good luck."
Your immediate response to the OP's question, despite NO indicators that it was necessary, was to ask if they had TREATED or tested for Varroa. Immediately. And when they said they had not, and had seen other keepers in the area that DID choose to treat have the same outcome, you gave them a snarky response comparing them to a naive child! This is what raised my hackles in the first place.
The OP asked a simple question, and when they opted NOT to pour chemicals on their hive, they were condescended to. I see this pattern repeatedly on bee keeping forums everywhere. That, and the fact that I see no indicator of Varroa in the first place. A starve-out is often just a starve-out. A new bee keeper may harvest too much in the fall, check too often when it's cold, feed incorrectly, or not enough, there's a bunch of factors that cause starve-outs in new hives that have nothing to do with Varroa. Bees will not eat honey that they haven't been able to keep warm. If the honey is too cold for them to consume, they starve. Seeing starve-outs when the hive has 80+ lbs of honey is completely normal and NOT a specific indicator of Varroa. It simply means that the bees, for SOME reason were unable to keep their cluster warm enough. A midwinter hive check can break propolis seals that the bees do not repair during the winter, causing drafts that kill them. Moisture falling on them can cool them rapidly, killing them. The fact that the hive bodies are 3/4" pine instead of the natural thick, insulated tree trunk could even be a problem in a particularly cold and windy winter. The bees NATURALLY do not eat ALL the honey to the walls, as much of that honey is insulation for the hive. Starveouts will almost ALWAYS have SOME honey still stocked.
I did a late fall split last year resulting in 3 weak hives that had starve-outs this spring. Completely unrelated to Varroa. One year I didn't seal the hive up for the winter, trying to see how they would fare. They didn't. They had starve outs. Completely unrelated to Varroa. There are thousands of factors that the OP wasn't even asked about.
When there's no indicator of Varroa in the first place, I don't think condescending to the OP because they didn't treat/test for a problem that has no indicators of existing is constructive.