To Rick and All,

Rick wrote: "In the Northeast we have not had warm weather since mid
December. Does anyone know how the cold has affected their bees? I can not
even reach my bees without wading in snow above my knees."

Although I live in the (cough, cough) South this has been a very cold and
snowy winter. I use a stethoscope to check viability of my hives instead of
lifting a cover or getting down on my hands and knees in the snow with a
flashlight, (been there done that- not fun!).  By rapping on a side of a
hive and then listening with a stethoscope on at least two opposite sides I
can get a "three dimensional" feedback by listening to the resulting BUZZ
from each knock. Stethoscopes are fairly cheap and can be found in most
drug stores.

Within a short matter of time I learned to judge with a high degree of
accuracy the size of the cluster and where they are within the hive, try
it!

I hear that a warm spell is coming to the eastern US this weekend!

Chuck Norton
Reidsville, NC