Early Spring / Late Winter inspection.

I have seen bees at all my hives flying around on the warmer days lately. Some of the days have been up in the 50s. We still have some very cold nights.

I opened up three of my hives to check on honey stores. I was wondering if I needed to start feeding.

Schampel Oscar
I was really worried about this one. This colony was from an August swarm and was very light when I moved it in October. I really din't expect it to last the winter. It did. It's currently 3 deeps tall. The bottom 2 contain the nest (no frames, natural comb from the top bars on top of box 2) the top box is frames with foundation. 3 are drawn out and still half full of honey - mostly capped - some uncapped. I don't know how much honey is in the nest. I am very excited to find honey in here at all. I'll watch this one closer than the others to make sure they have enough food to get to spring. Only a month more (give or take) before they should be able to forage.

Schampel TBH
This hive is doing very well. This colony was half of a split last spring. They queen was out of one of Paul's hives (carny mix of some sort). Very productive colony last summer.  They have several bars of honey on either end of the nest. I saw bees on both ends so I know they know it's there. Won't need to feed this one.

Rosier TBH
This colony is huge. They have many bars of honey on both sides as well. Very pleased with this one.

Empty TBH
This hive contained the other half of the split from last spring. This hive had the original queen. She never laid right after my attempt at splitting. Died off before fall. I poked around in the hive after moving it home in October and I suspect foul brood. The signs are there. The sunken caps on brood cells, some with holes in them. I did the string test but was not sure. I need to have someone else come look at it with me. I'd like to put a swarm or another split in it this spring if it's safe. Can't bare the thought of burning it up if it really is foul brood. Guess we'll see. Can't bare the thought of the foul brood spreading to my other colonies either.