What time of the year was that occurrence Michael? Spring or Fall?
My bees are surrounded by forest, lakes, ponds and bits of prairie. In the Spring they find the Skunk Cabbage in a nearby bog before we can smell it (it can/does flower in the snow) and when its just a bit above freezing (32F) we've seen them hitting on it.
We had 40F, calm w/ bright sunshine today. While placing hay around the beeyard I noticed that all 8 of my hives were busy at the entrances and flying off somewhere and for what, only they know :-\.
Propolis perhaps? I'd think it would be too cold to collect right now, no?
Could be water as the nearest pond hasn't quite frozen over yet, but there's been plenty of frost for water available.
One of the many wonders of keeping these fabulous creatures.