and locked on, will a cold front/storm push her off or
is she there for better or worse and in sickness or health?

I think once they are locked on they could care less about the weather. Unless a turd floater comes through and literally washes her away lol

My experience is that they stay.

I've seen them on beds one day in nice weather then went and caught them the next day in sleet/snow. I think a majority will stay.

Since big females don't lay all their eggs at once and typically lay in multiple beds, are they truly ever "locked on" for more than a day or so? I agree that when they are committed to the act, they will usually stay put. But I have also seen tons of fish on beds one day and gone the next after a severe lightening storm, over night.

Once they commit they will stay around but may not stay quite as locked in front conditions. They also can be tougher to catch when you get right up on them. If you know where they are then you can stay a long cast away and fish for them with weightless plastics, senko, fluke, wacky, or believe it or not topwaters worked painfully slow work real well in this scenario as well. Then you can catch a lot of them before they see you and spook. This is also how I handle bed fish who have constant boats on them at fork. If I have a bed pinpointed but know it's been fished hard I will try to get something right on or over the bed from a ways off and work it really slow.

Good info
Thanks guys

I've seen the weather chase a whole cove off of their beds, but that's not the norm. It can happen but usually once the females are locked on, they're there til they're done, as long as their beds don't get destroyed.

If the beds are empty in the mornings go back and check later in the day. I have had them to just appear out of the deeper water after the sun gets high. And like Billy said I have caught them from a distance, what we call cat fishing them when there spooky.