Question

[Rob Price]

When they say a queen has an "open brood nest" what does that mean?

[fish_stix]

Open brood is larva that have not been capped yet. Opening up the brood nest means to give the queen some empty frames to lay in, as in drawn empty comb.

[Michael Bush]

An open brood nest is one with space (clean empty cells) for the queen to lay in.

[tben]

Correct me if I'm wrong, but doesn't "running an open brood nest" also mean not using a queen excluder in the hive.

[Growing Boy]

Correct me if I'm wrong, but doesn't "running an open brood nest" also mean not using a queen excluder in the hive.

That's an unlimited brood nest.

[NeilV]

But getting rid of queen excluders is part of the way to keep an open brood next. It's hard to keep the area where the queen lays open if the queen is confined to a smaller space. You could rotate in empty comb, but then you would lose bees from the hive. I guess in theory you could rotate empty boxes under a queen excluder, but that would be a lot of work without much purpose.

[Rob Price]

I guess what I'm asking is in regards to this quote from RWeaver. "THE WEAVER ALL-AMERICAN BEE (ITALIAN BREED)
is an Italian strain that we have been improving for 84 years. Only superior performers are selected to become breeders. In general, the darker bees have shown the best traits, so our bees are not yellow but tend to be somewhat dark and quite variable in color. They tend to keep an open brood nest, as opposed to the Buckfast's tendency to put more honey down. Our All-Americans are also showing a high resistance to tracheal mites. They are excellent honey producers and are the preferred breed for the Southern States as well as the desert Southwest and California"

[frazzledfozzle]

Rob In this quote it means the bees tend to keep the brood area for brood only putting the honey up top in the honey super,

frazz

[Ben Brewcat]

This is one of those terms that I think has varying meanings. One can "open the brood nest" (verb) by inserting drawn comb or foundation in the existing brood nest, there is "open brood" meaning uncapped brood, etc.