Polar bees?

It was mighty cold out, 12 degrees when I woke up this morning; the windchill hovering at zero. I feared for my bee girls and was anxious to check on them. I keep a stethoscope on hand for just such occasions. I dug it out of my beekeeping equipment, donned it and a multitude of other winter wear, and headed to check my five hives. With much trepidation, I place the stethoscope in the upper middle of a hive box, guessing at where I figured the cluster might be. I heard a hum – or so I thought. I moved the stethoscope to another location, same hum. I just couldn’t be sure, a good scope picks up a lot of background noise. I planted my feet and stood very quietly so I wouldn’t crunch any of the surrounding leaves. I gave the hive a stiff rap. Wrrrr! Bees! My little heart went pitty pat. They survived the night. I checked all five hives and can say with certainty that 4 are humming along. At least today. They aren’t out of the woods for another 3 months, but this was certainly a test they passed. As to my fifth hive, I just can’t be certain. I may have placed the scope on the wrong spots. Maybe it’s a smaller cluster. I won’t know till it warms enough for them to fly. That looks like Thursday. And then I will know for sure. In the meantime, my heart is lighter knowing possibly all survived some bitter cold winds and temperatures. And for this keep, that’s some mighty good news.