>This year I will reverse the boxes putting the brood next to the excluder..

As Allen explained, important to understand the "why."  Plenty of other
ways than reversing--such as those that Allen mentioned.  Walt Wright
promotes "checkerboarding," which simply puts a break through the honey
arch.  The point is to either break the honey arch, or attract bees into
the box above the excluder.

The Australians that I've met all run single brood chambers, constantly
working boxes of stickies directly above the excluder.  The bees clear out
an arc of open cells above the excluder in preparation for the queen to lay
(even though she can't, due to the excluder).  But they then treat the box
above the excluder as part of the upper broodnest.

Bees don't recognize boxes of foundation as "comb"--but rather as space
cluttered with wax sheets.  Unless placed when and where bees are
behaviorally eager to draw out, the beekeeper will be disappointed.

-- 
Randy Oliver
Grass Valley, CA
www.ScientificBeekeeping.com

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