One of the symptoms seen in dying honey bee colonies is a dwindling of the adult population in late winter and early spring. This dwindling is characteristic of infection with the introduced tracheal mite, Acarapis woodi . Efforts to mitigate the adverse effects of tracheal mites on honey bees through management strategies or selective breeding regimes for mite resistance will require knowledge of the pathological effects of tracheal mites, which to date are poorly understood. A. woodi mites infect honey bees primarily during the first days of adult life, entering the trachea via the first thoracic spiracle.
Mites reproduce within the tracheae, generally increasing in number as bees age.
Honey bees live much longer during winter than summer, and winter colonies show the highest levels of mite infection, which may be responsible for the particularly high mortality of mite-infected colonies during winter and early spring.