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  • Brood up in the Honey super and the Queen is still down in the brood box the Wright side

  • General Q&A, Bee chat and only Bee chat please
General Q&A, Bee chat and only Bee chat please
 #3730  by Beckley.Bees
 23 Jun 2019, 19:00
On a inspection a week after putting my Honey Supers back on.
I found brood up in the super’s.
When I got down to the brood box taking the Queen excluder of then working though the frames.
I found the Queen.
My hives are Payne’s with plastic excluder’s.
Do you think the Queen could get though the excluder?
 #3748  by Beckley.Bees
 24 Jun 2019, 08:26
Hi Chris
Thanks for your post.
It’s a new QE but I will have a good look over it.
Do you think the metal excluders are better ?
Only when I make a regular hive inspection the plastic QE’s is often pushed up with Burr Combe which I always clean up when putting things back.
I am always very careful that it’s in position.
 #3750  by Patrick
 24 Jun 2019, 08:55
If plastic or metal are made properly then the gap for the bees to go through should be correct but the tolerances are small and queens vary too, whether in lay, newly mated or being slimmed down before swarming. There are sometimes defects or distortions (such as by the burr comb you mention). Whether metal slotted or wired is “better” is arguable. I do use wired framed excluders myself but also flat metal slotted when I run out.
 #3751  by Chrisbarlow
 24 Jun 2019, 10:46
Beckley.Bees wrote:
24 Jun 2019, 08:26
Hi Chris
Thanks for your post.
It’s a new QE but I will have a good look over it.
Do you think the metal excluders are better ?
Only when I make a regular hive inspection the plastic QE’s is often pushed up with Burr Combe which I always clean up when putting things back.
I am always very careful that it’s in position.
I use plastic QE myself. My critisism is they tend not to have bee space where as wired ones do. Having said that thornes do one called XP plus from memory which does have bee space. I don't remove burr comb as they only replace it. Which is best? Personal choice imo.
 #3785  by MickBBKA
 26 Jun 2019, 10:58
I have 2 colonies that have done that this month. We have had rain 26 days out of the last 30 and its been below 12C for quite a bit of it. Looking at the brood ages it looks as though the queens had gone of lay for a week. I think they became slimmer in mine and passed through the QE up to the warmer section but then moved down again as the brood pattern extended down.

If she is a young queen I find they often do this but mine are mostly black queens which are small to begin with.

Cheers, Mick.