HEllo and welcome, Since no one has answered I'll jump in. I'm not familiar with fowl smells/sick hive. I've only had my hive for a few years, however, I grew up with hives in the back yard. Every summer certainly in August, on certain days when the wind and air was just right, I could smell the hive, even thought I was . It was the smell of honey but it did smell different from the honey I smelled in the comb... maybe what I smelled was honey and bee sweat (lol). Burn a beeswax candle. That smell comes close to what I remember of the smell.

Misskimmie,

Thank you so much for answering. I thought I had subscribed to notifications of this thread but apparently didn't. You've definitely helped.

Sometimes a hive, especially when fairly new or if you move it, gives off an awesome lemony smell. This is from the nasanov glands of the workers telling their sisters where home is. Other times you just get a kind of sweet smell of wax and honey. After a while, you kind of recognize the smell of a healthy hive and it's wonderful