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Queen Excluder or not

15K views 42 replies 26 participants last post by  jmgi 
G
#1 ·
I am wondering if anyone out there uses a Queen excluder?
When i do it seems to keep out the bees.
When I don't I get a lot of brood in my honey suppers.
There has to be a better way to do this.
Thanks
Harold
 
#7 ·
This subject has been covered in a previous thread, you may wish to search for it. that said:

We use a single deep brood chamber, deep supers, an excluder, and see no evidence that the bees are reluctant to cross it. It helps however, to have strong hives. i can not imagine not using one.

Crazy Roland
 
#8 ·
I use excluders on all my hives and dont think I have any problems with honey production. If your having trouble getting the bees to cross the excluder you can wait a couple days for them to stat working the supers then put it on. I got tired of haveing brood in the honey supers and also wax moths were more of a problem in stored honey supers if they have had brood in them
 
#9 ·
If you are having problems with brood in your honey supers, a queen excluder will help. However, you must really use drawn comb above the excluder, at least to start, or the bees can be reluctant to cross it to draw foundation.

Is that brood mostly (or all) drone? If so, I would suggest a couple foundationless frames toward the outside of the bottom box. The bees will draw a bunch of drone comb, and raise drones there when they want them (typically early spring when they make a large crop and then sporadically through the rest of the summer) and they will not build drone comb in the honey supers. You can use the green drone comb, too -- the bees will use it for storage when they are not making drones.

Some people have much more trouble than others (or maybe I should say some bees make a lot more brood in honey supers than other). We have had only a single row, at most two, in the center of the combs in the bottom honey super, never more than that.

Peter
 
#10 · (Edited)
Roland didn't mention that he uses a main entrance directly above the excluder. This is important.

I don't usually use excluders, but have been trying TOP entrances this season and (due to discussion's with Roland) have tried using an excluder with them. The top entrance as the MAIN entrance makes a huge difference!

An excluder works much better when you have both a top AND bottom entrance. My top entrances are right at the top of the hive. Also, it may work better to start with only a top entrance a week or two before you put on the excluder, so that this is used as the main entrance.

I would recommend a bottom entrance of 1/2 inch most of the time, and no wider than 1 inch (unless you have temperatures above 35°C/95°F). I have found that bearding in hot weather has stopped, with having both entrances. The fanners go to the bottom entrance and draw air down through the hive and out the bottom. The evaporation from the nectar helps to cool the hive, with the wettest nectar at the top, air is drawn down. So the foragers come and go in the top entrance without having to dodge fanning bees. We've had temperatures of 40°C/104°F and looking at the top entrance, you wouldn't even think they were hot. (I did open the bottom entrance to a couple of inches on these days.)

The main thing is that the bees store less nectar in the brood nest and more above the excluder! This helps to reduce backfilling of the brood nest, therefore reducing conditions for swarm preparation as well.

Matthew Davey
 
#12 ·
When I use front facing top entrances above the excluder I get mated virgins moving in the honey supers. How do you stop that?
 
#21 ·
Odfrank, have you been putting brood frames above the excluder with eggs or young larvae?

I have seen queen cells started, but usually when there is at least a super in-between or they are not used to an excluder. The sudden drop in queen pheromone to the isolated nurse bees, even just for a few hours, can be enough for emergency queen cells to be started. Once queen cells are started they are often finished.

Otherwise, as Roland said, it sounds like they have swarmed.

Matthew Davey
 
#13 ·
I read somewhere that turning the QE sideways can help. There are gaps at the front and back where the queen can go through, but she normally won't because she doesn't usually venture to the very front or back of the frames. Never tried it though to see how well it works.
 
#14 ·
If you're thinking of trying queen excluders, I recommend you read this POV article, queen excluders or honey excluders to discover the best way to use them.
- + - + - +
What happened to me, was that I discovered my hives were being devastatingly depopulated by local endemic desert toads. I realized that I needed to take drastic action to turn this around. I made myself some screened bottom boards (with no entrances). Next, I made some rims to use for creating upper entrances. I didn't think to add the excluders and drone/queen escape holes, until I read the POV article, referenced, above.
* ^ * ^ * ^
odfrank,
I've only had that happen, once (so far). I do leave small entrance holes in all the supers beneath the excluder -- for drones and queen use.
 
#15 ·
Ive used them for years now. I dont have any data not useing them.

I like not having to worry about brood in my honey supers.

I do use an upper entrance above the excluder as well as a lower entrance below it. I do think it will lead to swarming issues if you dont watch the bottom boxes and make shure they have plenty of space below the excluder.

After i have a full super of honey above it, i have removed it useing the honey super as a natural excluder. Ive been told (and somewhat experienced) that the queen will not cross the "honey barrier" to seek space above. but again, at that point you also risk swarming behavor if there isnt enough room in the brood box.(s)
 
#17 ·
We ran w/o excluders for 10 years then got tired of dealing with brood in honey supers since we extract several times through the year. We added supers and an upper entrance (jog the 2nd honey super back 1/4 inch) and find it works exceptionally well for us. We also like the fact the bees seem to take a little more of the late summer flow and make big bands above the cluster filling it in as brood dwindles and space opens. I think we winter better as a result of earlier season honey stores in the brood chamber.
 
#19 ·
Matt Davey said:

The main thing is that the bees store less nectar in the brood nest and more above the excluder! This helps to reduce backfilling of the brood nest, therefore reducing conditions for swarm preparation as well.


I concure.

I neglected to speak of upper entrances. We also set back every super one bee space to form upper entrances. Be sure to close them back up before fall to prevent robbing.

OdFrank - better swarm control might prevent your virgin problem, otherwise put an excluder between each box, and the next round you will know where the queen is.

Crazy Roland
 
#22 ·
I have tried it both ways for the past couple years and I really can't see much difference in honey production. But, it is a lot easier to pull honey with excluders you can keep taking off boxes until you get down to the excluder. When I don't use excluders I sometimes have to leave the last super on to let the brood hatch out before I pull it off. This causes extra work. Now that I have started to move my hives a little more I'm going to use them on all of my hives so the hives will be the same size when I get ready to load them up.
 
#23 ·
Isaac Hopkins was a commercial beekeeper who later became the State Apiarist of New Zealand and he was quite eloquent on the matter. Here's what he had to say in The Australasian Bee Manual:

“Queen Excluders... are very useful in queen rearing, and in uniting colonies; but for the purpose they are generally used, viz., for confining the queen to the lower hive through the honey season, I have no hesitation in condemning them. As I have gone into this question fully on a previous occasion, I will quote my remarks:—

“The most important point to observe during the honey season in working to secure a maximum crop of honey is to keep down swarming, and the main factors to this end, as I have previously stated, are ample ventilation of the hives, and adequate working-room for the bees. When either or both these conditions are absent, swarming is bound to take place. The free ventilation of a hive containing a strong colony is not so easily secured in the height of the honey season, even under the best conditions, that we can afford to take liberties with it; and when the ventilating—space between the lower and upper boxes is more than half cut off by a queen-excluder, the interior becomes almost unbearable on hot days. The results under such circumstances are that a very large force of bees that should be out working are employed fanning-, both inside and out, and often a considerable part of the colony will be hanging outside the hive in enforced idleness until it is ready to swarm.

"Another evil caused by queen-excluders, and tending to the same end—swarming—is that during a brisk honey-flow the bees will not readily travel through them to deposit their loads of surplus honey in the supers, but do store large quantities in the breeding-combs, and thus block the breeding-space. This is bad enough at any time, but the evil is accentuated when it occurs in the latter part of the season. A good queen gets the credit of laying from two to three thousand eggs per day: supposing she is blocked for a few days, and loses the opportunity of laying, say, from fifteen hundred to two thousand eggs each day, the colony would quickly dwindle down, especially as the average life of the bee in the honey season is only about six weeks.

"For my part I care not where the queen lays—the more bees the more honey. If she lays in some of the super combs it can be readily rectified now and again by putting the brood below, and side combs of honey from the lower box above; some of the emerging brood also may be placed at the side of the upper box to give plenty of room below. I have seen excluders on in the latter part of the season, the queens idle for want of room, and very little brood in the hives, just at a time when it is of very great importance that there should be plenty of young bees emerging.”
 
#25 ·
"Another evil caused by queen-excluders, and tending to the same end—swarming—is that during a brisk honey-flow the bees will not readily travel through them to deposit their loads of surplus honey in the supers, but do store large quantities in the breeding-combs, and thus block the breeding-space. This is bad enough at any time, but the evil is accentuated when it occurs in the latter part of the season. A good queen gets the credit of laying from two to three thousand eggs per day: supposing she is blocked for a few days, and loses the opportunity of laying, say, from fifteen hundred to two thousand eggs each day, the colony would quickly dwindle down, especially as the average life of the bee in the honey season is only about six weeks.

Just when I thought beesource was evolving on the whole excluder debate we're swept back into the primordial goo.... "Another evil..." that's a little dramatic. I guess if you call using a tool the wrong way "evil" then I'm good with the drama.

Not sure how you where running your hives with excluders, but I have never seen problems with swarming. The key, as mentioned repeatedly in this thread, is the use of an upper entrance.

Sure, if you put an excluder under bare foundation and no upper entrance swarming will certainly occur. There have been countless stories here about this usage, I feel, leading to the overwhelming confusion. But if I drive a nail with a screwdriver I'll likely gouge the wood - is that the screwdrivers fault? The QE is a tool, and like any tool there are right and wrong ways to use it. I use them on every production colony. My yields exceed the state average by a factor of 3 (conservatively) and beyond other local bee keepers in my area. I mark all production queens and keep good records so a swarming event will be discovered.
 
#24 ·
Keeping queens confined to the brood nest with an excluder is invaluable in controlling shb in your extracting facility. I also think (but dont have actual proof of this) that it keeps any issues with chemical residues in older brood combs from tainting any of your honey supers. A top entrance of some sort is probably a good idea if for no other reason than ventilation.
 
#26 ·
Astrobee - could it be that those that condemn excluders are not as adept at managing a hive(swarm, population), as those that see them as a tool? This seems to be a recurrent pattern, those that claim to have more productive , populace hives, seem to have fewer issues with excluders, whereas those that have problems with hive management, swarming, and building populations, seem to blame excluders..... Or I just might be crazy.

Crazy Roland
 
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