Bees are naturally relunctant to go through an excluder. You can help this by:
a) baiting them up by placing brood above the excluder
b) providing an entrance above the excluder
c) removing the excluder and running an unlimited brood nest - why would you want to limit a queen that wanted to lay anyway?

From time to time I want to remove a frame of honey for my own use. Having a frame of honey/brood/queen cells/is what one would expect to find, if the queen were to have access to the entire hive.

My understanding is the reason for the excluder is to limit the queen in her egg laying to the brood boxes below the excluder, leaving the upper smaller supers free for the worker bees to store and cap honey, without being involved with brood and other cells.

When you remove frames then, how can you ensure that you will only be taking honey, if you allow the queen free roam of the hive?

Perhaps I am unaware of how it can be done other than to exclude the queen from such areas.

If I am raising them strictly for pollinating purposes, free roam would be fine, but it seems if one were to harvest honey without killing larvae, etc., the queen would need to be limited to her laying area.

Just my 2 c's.

Bejay

I run all of my hives with unlimited brood nest. Many beekeepers do the same. It's not the problem you make it out to be. Generally there are frames of honey and frames of brood. I do see the occassional frame of brood in a super. When I do I leave it or move it down to the brood nest (the advantage of running all mediums). You won't find brood in every frame by any means. As the hive fills with honey, the queen is generally force down and she doesn't like to cross a band of honey as it splits the brood nest. The time you are most likely to find brood outside the brood nest is in early spring when they are building up. This is when you want all the bees you can get, so it really makes even less sense to limit the queen. There is a reason many beekeepers call them "honey excluders", although they are used successfully by many beekeepers.

I appreciate the reply. So far, I do have an unlimited brood in my hive in the bottom 3 boxes - 2 larger boxes of brood and one small super on top, then the excluder and another small super.

My present hive is not actively worked for growth management(which I prefer as I hope to keep it a small backyard effort anyway). So I enter the hive very little and usually only to harvest a frame or two.

You mentioned creating another opening perhaps in the top box above the excluder. Wouldn't the bees just block off the entrance from within - preferring the hive to be dark inside - or perhaps even encourage robbing?

Most of my knowledge comes from reading books - I am aware that practical experience is usually much better information. Perhaps that is what makes these forums so valuable.

Thank you again.

Bejay

No, the bees normally will not block the upper entrance. All of mine actively use it. All you have to do is prop the lid 3/8" to create the upper entrance. In zone 10, it should really help the bees deal with the heat in summer. You won't have to work the hive for growth, the bees will do that on their own if there are sufficient forage in the area. You will almost certainly have a swarm at some time if you don't make splits or otherwise manage the bees.

I see you are using deeps for the brood nest. Many do, but I went to all mediums for the following reasons:
1) deeps just weigh too much. I don't want to lift 100# boxes
2) With all one size (mediums) I can move frames around at will. For instance, I would move a couple of frames from the brood box above the excluder to bait the bees up, or I could move brood down.
It's very convenient and better on my back. A much more active bee discussion board is

Here is a link that might be useful: Beesource forums

As my days grow shorter, and strength dimishes - I can certainly agree with your using ALL medium supers in your hives. New bee raisers "take note." I only wish someone had advised me sooner.

About swarming - since the beginning of this particular set-up, I've seen only one sign of swarming, but as that was how I originally obtained my bees, it is difficult to know if they are mine or somebody elses.

Our town seems to have this time of year when swarms are seen - especially near the ocean. A few years ago, when wild fires were threatening eastward, their were many bee swarms at that time.

Do you have any helpful ideas for newcombers to prevent swarming? - also thanks for the link.

Bejay

The bees will get swarmy if the brood nest gets congested, yet another reason for unlimited brood nest IMHO. Make sure that there are empty frames available for the queen to lay in. You can do this by rotating honey filled frames out of the brood nest and replacing them with foundation, drawn, or empty frames. I don't use foundation anymore myself. If you see queen cells drawn near the bottoms of frames, it's time to split the hive. You can recombine later if you don't want to maintain another hive. Queen cells in the middle or upper part of frames are normally supercedure cells and should be left alone.