BBKA Forum

The US article (link below) suggests tipping the brood box up to look at the floor of the hive to glean some information about the state of the colony. I can't recall that being something that's suggested in this country apart from old books referring to changing the bottom boards in spring. Should we be tipping our hives up more?

https://beeinformed.org/2020/01/31/look-down/

This reminds me of taking out the plastic insert to see uncappings during winter as a good indicator of a colony being alive.

I believe inspecting all parts of a hive is good practice, the question is , how often.

While we are on the subject...would any of you do a very quick inspection in winter and deep snow?
Have a look at these two videos and see if it chances your attitude to opening up a hive or a Nuc (albeit briefly) in severe weather.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Gi6blu8x8lk
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=PbOGFxfjL44

Saw this video a few years ago now. It's an excellent example of a good reason to open a box of bees up from a welfare point of view. Regardless of the weather, if bees are at the risk of starving then opening up to feed is fine.

I switched from feeder boards to frame-top feeding mid season and in the process was taken aback at the blast of warmth that came out of the boxes
That warmth would have to have been replaced .
Luckily I did the majority at trickle time so it wasn't a complete farce.
Another lesson learned for me

Don't the Americans use open mesh floors which don't need scraping?

It seems obvious from the OP's video that this is for solid floors and given the conditions, perhaps an open mesh is not an option (extreme cold etc.).
I am mindful of more experienced beekeepers's warnings that the winter cluster is not to be disturbed but in the video the temperature has risen to a point that they are not only unclustered but populous as well. So I would assume that the beekeeper has decided he can open up without harm. Is it better to take off the coverboard and lose that bubble of warmth or lift up the brood box?
I don't think I need to do this particular manipulation but I wouldn't dismiss it as an option. I hefted my hives the other day and ticked the available stores box. The bees weren't clustered right under the perspex feeder covered feeder holes. The weather has been mild enough to see bees in numbers flying from the hive so I assume they can move to access stores. They sound as though they are wintering well when I listen with my ear pressed against the brood box. The entrance is clear.... Why do more?
So I put the fondant back in the car/garage and will re-inspect in mid-February unless the weather gets very warm, in which case I'll heft/look/listen sooner.

It’s an interesting one, isn’t it?

Obviously don’t know a lot about the context but assume you have there a commercial beekeeper with large populous hives being fed pollen supplement to keep them booming despite heavy snow, presumably ready to come straight out of the blocks for their first task. If the supplement runs out they will stall.

As an amateur, I don’t particularly need to maintain artificially boosted colonies in the off season. I heft to check on stores, know we have locally available early pollen if they can collect it and beyond that can probably not usefully intervene much between October and March. But I don’t have any qualms about taking off crownboards to feed fondant if the alternative is likely starving, The gain is worth much more than the small downside. There is a big difference to me between simply opening or raising a hive and physically removing frames with clustered bees on.

As all mine are on OMFs, tipping up would not tell me much but solid floors seem more standard in US.