Hi,

Did the colony swarm during the season?

Try reversing the upper and lower brood chambers to get the queen laying in
both chambers. Don't put a honey super between the brood chambers. How do
you rectify the situation?  Get the queen laying in both brood chambers.
Either by reversing or just move brood down into the lower. Check your queen
to see if she was superceded of is failing! You say you don't want to feed
sugar syrup. Why not just leave the honey supers on if light. That is food
last I checked. I manage my bees in triple brood chambers. You my want to
give it a try.  You will rarely need your queen excluder this way and
feeding is easy as they are feed by themselves.

Clay