The Bee's spring
Saturday, December 21, is winter solstice for us, but it is the first day of spring for the bees. As the days get longer, the queen will ramp up egg laying to get ready for the flowers. Your hive population will double to triple before the first flower blooms, so the food will go much faster. The consumption of winter stores will increase as the number of new mouths to feed increase. Starvation will be much more of a problem as the stores decrease before the first nectar becomes available. Keep this in mind and watch your hives carefully.
I had one hive that had very little activity compared to the others, I opened it up on a 55 degree day for 2 seconds, and saw a 3 frame cluster
I hope they do get bigger, isn't that a little small? see it here:
Some subspecies of bees will have small winter clusters while others are larger. They are probably alright, besides, there's not much you can do about it at this point. Just be sure they have enough food and hope for the best.
They are Saskatraz bees, We'll see, I hope they brood up, there are plenty of stores in there for them.