[iowastan]

I am new to beekeeping. Last year I bought one package & caught 3 swarms so I wintered 4 hives. I built insulated enclosures for my bee hives & they all made it thru the Cold Iowa winter. This Spring & early summer the girls have been swarming like crazy. I have now 9 hives.

I can't get my bees to draw out wax coated poly-cell above queen excluders. I have heard or read somewhere about a second entrance above the excluder. Has anyone tried this? Does it help? Also has anyone tried the plastic foundation with dots in the bottom to keep the queen from laying in them?

 

[peacekeeperapiaries]

there are several other recent posts on this topic, use the search function on the tool bar. Are you on a flow right now?? Possibly place a frame of open brood above the excluder, or take the excluders off replace them after they start drawing and storing

 

[BonnieBee]

The girls won't go thru an excluder when all you have over it is foundation.
What you need to do is 'bait' the super by placing at least one frame of drawn wax.
Or, you can place the super with foundation only on the hive, minus the excluder and after a couple of days, check on it and if the girls have drawn out even a little bit then slip an excluder underneath otherwise the queen will start laying in the super.

 

[Peter]

I'm not using any excluder and have no issue with the queen moving up into the supers. Think it is somewhat dependant on whether they have enough space in their brood boxes.

 

[Ben Brewcat]

Ditch the excluder, and mist the frames with light syrup. Once the bees have tracked them up a little, I think the odor of plastic becomes more acceptable and they'll start to draw if there's a flow on.