[shinbone]

Gonna try raising queens using a Cloake board. I see they come with either a plastic queen excluder or a metal queen excluder. Anyone got any advice on whether the plastic or metal is preferred for this application?

Also, anyone have any advice to offer on other featuers to include or avoid with Cloake boards? I don't have the time or tools to make my own Cloake board, so I will be buying one, and I want to make sure I get a good one.

TIA

--shinbone

 

[My-smokepole]

I know that I have a bunch of broken plastic queen excluder's. Where the metal ones may be rusty bent but will function for some thing.
David

 

[shinbone]

Thanks for the response. I am concerned about durability, since a Cloake board spends so much time of the year getting knocked around in storage. I am leaning towards metal for that reason alone.

 

[AstroBee]

I prefer metal for an application like this. In general I'm not a big fan of plastic excluders.

 

[shinbone]

Looking at the major suppliers' websites, I am seeing only one that offers a Cloake board with metal queen excluder . . .

 

[Goran]

Gonna try raising queens using a Cloake board. I see they come with either a plastic queen excluder or a metal queen excluder. Anyone got any advice on whether the plastic or metal is preferred for this application?

Also, anyone have any advice to offer on other featuers to include or avoid with Cloake boards? I don't have the time or tools to make my own Cloake board, so I will be buying one, and I want to make sure I get a good one.

TIA

--shinbone

I don't have too much free time and assets. I used last year hard cardboard sheet and normal framed metal wired qe with entrance. After use ( jenter+cloake or so) I throw away ( "recycle bin") cardboard. So of all needed new equipment for it is temporary cardboard, and standard qe which is on each hive anyway.

 

[crofter]

Really not too hard to make if you dont go fancy. Use a separate metal excluder under it. Just need a saw kerf in the wood for the metal sheet to slide in. If you want to make something temporary just cut two strips 3/4" wide by 3/8 thick wood to go on top of each side of the excluder to support the upper hive body and use a piece of thin plywood for the slide. The gap front and back of the hive can be reduced or close one or the other to make the upper entrance where you want it.

 

[j.kuder]

the only thing the cloake board does is make it easy to slide the solid divider board in and out. you can accomplish the same end result with a little more work just by putting your queen excluder on let the nurse bees move up to the brood then slip any kind of a divider such as corregated plastic, thin ply wood or sheet metal on top of the excluder. once the queen cells are started pull the divider out mission accomplished.