Well we have had a few nice days and the Maple trees are starting to bud out. At the end of February we had a few nice days and I was able to get in and check on the bees. Out of the seven colonies that we had going into winter it appears that we currently have 5 that have made it this far. We lost two that were nucleus colonies that I was trying to overwinter. It appears that they simply ran out of food, which is so sad. Most of my loses in the past I think have been due to other problems that weren't food related, so loosing two colonies this way is incredibly sad to me.
The other 5 hives are at various stages based on the food that they currently have. I have one hive that had 4 mediums for the winter and they appear to be quite alright not even close to making it to the top of the hive for food. The other four all seem to have some honey left, but not as much as I would like to see. So I added about a pound of dry sugar on some newpaper to the top of each hive. I am hoping that this will get them through to when the Maple trees are in full bloom and there are a few days that they can fly and forage.
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