Queen Excluders
July 24, 2013
In a natural hive environment, a queen will lay
eggs wherever she feels like (I am told queens lay eggs in a spiral pattern).
Honey cells are not necessarily separated from cells with larvae. This is fine,
unless you would go to eat a piece of honeycomb and half of it was bee larvae.
I can’t imagine that would be very tasty. In order to keep honey cells and
‘bee’ cells separate, many beekeepers will use what is called an excluder. It keeps
the queen from laying eggs in honey supers with honey. Excluders work because
queens are larger in size than worker bees so queens cannot pass through an
excluder. Drones are also too large to fit through an excluder. Some beekeepers
like excluders and some don’t. Non-fans have termed them ‘honey excluders’
because they believe that if a bee doesn’t have to go through another step to
get to the honey part of the hive, then it won’t. If you plan on keeping bees
mainly for the honey, I would suggest getting one.
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