I went to my bee yard that I was planning a total redo this spring. New boxes and frames. I did not cover them with winter wraps. Many were weak in the fall. I left food on the one and it made it in spite of a winter cover. While I covered most of my others and many are still alive this does prove that bees are tough creatures as long as they have food and are as mite free as possible.
I thought it was a good way to illustrate how easy it is to check for food and hive strength. You can see in the video, a quick check and I saw 6 frames of capped honey in the super and at least four frames of bees. Even on a 20 degree day a quick peek is ok. The hive wasn't open more than 15 seconds. I knew what I was looking for, so that cut the open time to very little. The hive looked good and I am fairly confident they will make it, barring any extended cold weather or queen problem.
If I had food issues I could have put on a candy board or some granulated sugar as described in an earlier post.