Alan Riach <[log in to unmask]> writes:
> However I don't think excluders hinder the bees at all

Greetings,
I am sure the moderators do not want us to get into a long pro and con discussion on queen excluders. I think the point is, you can make them work if you want them and you can get by without them if you don't. In California, nobody I knew used them. We just supered up and took honey off. There was occasional brood to deal with, which we usually just moved down when removing the supers.

Now, I use them on every hive because I am frequently replacing the queen for experimental purposes and I would much rather have her confined to two boxes than running loose in four or five. In fact, we are thinking about putting her in one box. How many people have had experience keeping the queen in the first story only? Of course, I would have ten excellent combs in there so they could raise the maximum amount of brood.

Alan also wrote:
>Queen Excluder design is one of these items which is truly beyond the wit of man

I love this! This was eminently well put! I have given up worrying about how to reduce burr comb and designed a device for removing it. It consists of a hive body with four heat lamps in it. I stack up a drip board, an empty body, the wire queen excluder, and place the heat lamps on top of this. The lamps melt the burr comb in about 3 or 4 minutes, which drips into the drip board. I keep swapping the excluders and the melted wax drips through a hole in the drip board into a pail. I cleaned almost 200 this way in a couple of days.