KBBA 
Bulletin

Welcome to 2023! What's new for you and your bees? With all of this crazy weather it's hard to find a day to peek in on the girls to see how they are faring. Chances are the best you can do right now is lift up the back of the hive and see how heavy it is compared to when you tucked them in for fall. If you get a warmish day - the bees are flying for cleansing, you can do a quick feed. There are several ways to get some emergency feed in. The mountain camp method is very easy - one sheet of newspaper on top of the frames with loose drivert sugar on it. KBBA has drivert sugar available in 5 and 10 pound bags. You can also make fondant for them. There are lots of recipes online. Rusty Burlew has some great information on fondant and bee candy here: Honey Bee Suite. I will share that my fondant always comes out as hard candy. I don't think the bees really care much about your candy making skills.

Rusty has a nice Q & A about mountain camp feeding here: Honey Bee Suite

The bees really don't need pollen patties yet. They use the protein from pollen to feed brood. We are bound to still have some very cold weather and you want to make sure there are enough bees to keep the brood warm. While they are starting to build back up now, you don't want the population to boom just yet.