Hey Justin, I just drizzled my bees and had the same situation as you where My bottom deep was pretty much totally empty. My super had about four frames of bees and a good amount of honey still in it. It’s an 8 frame hive. I’m in Mocksville, North Carolina, do you think a hive consisting of an eight frame super has a good chance of survival? Barring other circumstances of course. I didn’t go digging around for the queen in case I would crush her. But the bee seems docile enough.
I have overwintered smaller clusters…it just kind of depends on the weather, how their food is arranged and so on. You may want to consider putting a fondant patty right on top of their cluster so they don’t have to move for food. The smaller clusters can’t move across to another frame as well as larger clusters and they end up starving with food and inch away.
