Bees "usually" start brood rearing anew shortly after the winter solstice....21st of Dec. So before the end of the Dec is about as good as it gets.. If you had a hive monitoring temperature gauge you would see a sudden increase in temperature up to 34C in the cluster. Then you would know they have started to rear next years new brood. This is when they really start to burn through their stores generating that heat.
It's also important to act quickly if you think a hive is really short of stores. Bees share their resources equally and fairly whilst they have them. This means the bees within a hive can all die out within a few hours of each other if they have no more food to share.
It's also important to act quickly if you think a hive is really short of stores. Bees share their resources equally and fairly whilst they have them. This means the bees within a hive can all die out within a few hours of each other if they have no more food to share.