I have been following this discussion with interest and feel that Randy's comments are maybe getting to the heart of it.

I am in the northern inter-mountain area of eastern WA. Hard cold winters and spring can be sporadic. Colonies with ample honey stores (12 frames at least) don't seem to have difficulty maintaining thermo regulation even during the severe cold of mid winter with no additional insulation. A large healthy cluster in the fall below said honey slowly eats its way up and I have not seen the mentioned gap between brood and stores. Most will keep a fairly small (softball or a bit larger) brood nest in early spring starting in Feb. and greatly expand that with warming days in March and April. One key may be healthy fall bees that survive long enough into the spring build-up to keep a population large enough to maintain the expanding brood nest. I have seen spring dwindle of overwintered, apparently unhealthy, bees that reduce the cluster before their replacements have emerged leading to some of the problems described. What I usually see on first inspection in late Feb. or early March is a large cluster with a small brood area surrounded by a thin layer of "wet" honey and capped honey beyond that. I believe that a large enough cluster can cover and warm stored honey and move it closer to the brood and as long as capped honey is available with the occasional exception of the very outermost fame surfaces the brood nest expands and the stores disappear without incident. 

I use no candy boards or other supplemental winter feed. All are double deeps with telescoping lids but no other insulation or wrap. If a colony gets dangerously light in spring before daytime temps are in the 40s I'll feed a pound or two of Dryvert on newspaper on the top bars and repeat if necessary. I call this PPB on my part meaning that they were not heavy enough in Oct. I use inverted gallon buckets  just over the inner cover hole of medium heavy syrup (8 gal H2O /100 lbs sugar) to tide over any that start "licking the skillet" before nectar is coming in in late April or May. They don't seem to have a problem taking this even when night temps dip into the 20s. If they don't take a gallon in 24 hr. I take note. If not in 48 hr. there is a problem. I am definitely not trying to stimulate brood production but just keep them from starving. Once natural nectar is coming in they expand quickly and then we're in swarm control mode. My stock is my own carniolans and WSU program cells and I know that that makes a difference.

To sum-up, I think that if the cluster can't keep contact with the stores it is too small and that problem needs attention. Fall management  is where I would look.

Paul Hosticka
Dayton WA

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