We have used excluders on all our hives for many years, both for extracted
honey and cut comb.

1  Bees don't willingly go through two barriers. You have trouble if you
put on an excluder and a box of foundation and you have trouble if you put
on an excluder above a brood chamber that is jammed with honey. We put our
extracting supers on fairly early in the season, they have residual honey
from last year and there is very little problem with bees refusing to go
through the excluder.

2  When making cut comb we started them with a wet extracting super over
the excluder. When the super was nearly ready to take we put the comb
honey super between it and the excluder. This usually occurred at the end
of the dandelion flow and just before the alfalfa and canola. They seemed
willing to draw comb above the excluder at this time.

3  We have tried using excluders with top entrances. It doesn't seem to
make much difference, although there is then some pollen stored above the
excluders.

4  We extract two or three times during our main flow. ( We have a problem
with the canola honey granulating in the combs if left on very long). The
advantage to excluders is that you can extract honey during the flow
without worrying about losing your queen. This enables you to operate with
a much smaller inventory of supers and a smaller capacity extracting
outfit.

Best regards,

Donald Aitken
Edmonton Alberta Canada