RE: finding the queen by straining the bees thru and excluder I use this method a lot when re-queening. In fact, I have a dedicated super for it. It works better if the super is brand new. The bees tend to cling to to the sides of an old one, as it may have bits of comb or propolis on the inside. I nailed the excluder to the bottom of the empty super and put a wood rim on the protect the excluder and help hold it in place. I shake the bees onto the excluder and use smoke and a bee brush to keep them moving thru the excluder. Some hives go more easily than others, some seem to want to move up rather than down. Occasionally one finds rwo and even three queens this way. -- Peter Borst <[log in to unmask]>