2/20/14: Had a warm spell the past two days that will change to cold soon. I had a small amount of time to check in the hives quickly before dark. It was 46 degrees F and cloudy, about 6pm, had rained earlier in the day.
Of the 5 hives alive on 12/22/13, 2 are still alive.
2013 Hives 1 and 4 had approximately soccer ball sized clusters near the top of the hives. Hives 2, 3, and 5 had frozen. I moved nearly full honey supers from hives 2 and 3 and placed them on hives 1 and 4 to give them more food for the coming cold spell. Fingers crossed they will make it through. Plan to order 3 packages.
Interesting that none of the surviving colonies were packages with either a known Italian or known Carniolan queen. They were both from Alan Travers, one a nuc from a cutout that may have been survivor stock and one a swarm he captured.
