When restarting the SMB (samba) service on the (linux) server, the network share holding the pictures is unavailable for a few seconds. Digikam (Windows) immediately removes the tree from collection. I have looked through the options/preferences and did not find an option to prevent this behaviour.
The share is added as 'Network Share.' Is this correct or should it be added as 'Local Share?' Since the mount point is 'local to windows' e.g. F:/ H:/.

Am I doing something wrong or is this a bug?

It also happens sometimes when pc comes back from hibernate.

Filing bug report if no reply to this post.