Mick Bozard asks about queen exluders on the bottom of colonies...
 
I would think that the biggest problem with putting a queen excluder
below the brood box is that a queen excluder is also a drone excluder -
you will soon have a colony loaded with dead drones that the bees are
unable to clean out. Also, queen excluders don't work 100% of the time -
some virgin queens can fit through, as well as some queens that are
ready to depart with a swarm.
 
Why would you want to do this anyhow? What if your queen was killed,
and you didn't know about it - the bees may requeen themselves, and
then the queen NEEDS to go on her mating flights - if your Q-excluder
prevents that, you have just killed your colony. If you are doing it to
prevent swarming, there are better ways to do it that are not as injurious
to the health of the colony.
 
Rick Hough,
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30 minutes NE of Boston, MA