Just a heads up, especially if you are in Tayside. Came across a set of plainly disturbed hives near Dundee today whilst doing heather prep.

These were double deep hives with brood in 12 to 15 bars, plenty food and pollen, but were being robbed.

Almost no bees, no queen, no q.cells, brood in all stages inc eggs, combs not back in correct order. Shook swarms plainly been removed from them.

The bad news for the thief is that this apiary has had EFB earlier in the summer and is still under a standstill order, and one of the hives shaken was the one next to the (removed and destroyed earlier) EFB case. This must be considered a super high risk bit of theft............. so if you are offered bees by an unknown source in the area be very very careful.