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For the Love of Queen Excluders
By: Becky Masterman & Dan Whitney
Either loved or hated by beekeepers, the queen excluder might just be the industry’s most controversial piece of equipment. We argue that a queen excluder is not only helpful, but it might also be one of the most versatile tools that a beekeeper has available. Let’s explore this queen blocking wire or plastic screen and see why some beekeepers can’t keep without them.
Brood Free Honey Crop
Props to Ukrainian beekeeper Petro Prokopovych (1775-1850) for coming up with the idea of how to exclude brood from honey supers. His industry innovations are impressive and also include the moveable frame and bee beards! Beekeepers today are familiar with wire and plastic queen excluders. Placed above the brood nest and under honey supers, they are an effective way to keep the queen and her eggs from making honey harvesting a more difficult job. They also afford some protection when harvesting honey as depending on your method, you can be confident that the queen is safe in the brood nest. While recommended for beekeepers who are just starting out, you will find queen excluders in large commercial operations as well.
Beekeepers argue whether queen excluders increase or decrease honey production. Some recent studies show both increases or no change in yields. The variation of production is to be expected with the variability in honey bee subspecies and lines. In some operations and hive configurations, the queen excluder might restrict the brood nest size and thus increase honey yields.
Are you convinced that queen excluders impact honey quality? A German research team is gathering data about how using a queen excluders in honey producing colonies can impact its condition. This team studied honey production in biodynamic beekeeping operations that managed colonies both with and without queen excluders (Bundschuh et al., 2026). Their recently publication shared that both diastase activity (think freshness) and antioxidant capacity were not different between honey collected in colonies regardless of whether queen excluders were used. Moisture trended higher one year in some honey produced in colonies using queen excluders, but it was not significant.
Statistical analysis did reveal significant differences when analyzing honey using Image Forming Methods (IFM) and Food Induced Emotions (FIE) to compare the use of queen excluders in honey production. Image Forming Methods are used to assess the physiological state of the sample. Food Induced Emotions data are gathered from questionnaires used to explore the reactions of the tasters to the different honey samples. The honey from the colonies managed without queen excluders performed significantly better in both tests. What is the difference between colonies in each group? The study reported the concerns that beekeepers have about the queen excluder separating the honey from the nest (Gerstmeier & Miltenberger, 2018).
Queen Locator
A queen excluder can help you find a queen in a 2 deep hive configuration without actually finding the queen. This technique can help you when you want to divide your colonies. Four days prior to splitting your colony, equalize resources and brood in each hive box and then place a queen excluder between them. When you come back on divide day, separate the boxes and check for eggs. The box with eggs is the box with the queen. If both boxes have eggs, check the integrity of your queen excluder.
You can also use this method to help you find your queen if you must remove her from the colony. It will cut the number of frames you need to search in half.
Another queen excluder queen finding method is to place it over an empty hive body and start shaking frames. The workers will pass through leaving the queen and drones unable to move into the deep box. While it may be effective, this method is also disruptive!
Demaree Method
Queen excluders are essential to execute the Demaree method. Beekeepers use this management maneuver to prevent swarming in a two deep hive configuration. The colony is set up to give the queen ample space to lay eggs. Instead of making a divide with the remaining brood, it is moved to the top of the hive stack. The brood boxes are split with the queen, minimal brood, empty combs, food resources in the bottom deep and the remaining brood and food resources in the top deep. A queen excluder is placed over the bottom deep and two supers are added on top of it. Another queen excluder is placed over the two supers with the 2nd box of brood without the queen placed on top.
By placing two supers in between the box with the queen and the rest of the brood nest, the colony is essentially divided in place. The workers will raise queen cells in the top deep and they must be culled to prevent a new queen from being reared. After 21 days, the deeps can be recombined and you have maintained the colony population without moving bees away in a divide. If you get a nice Spring nectar flow, the two empty supers might be full of honey!
A modification of this method is to use this set up and come back after the sun has set or before it rises to move the top deep of bees, brood, and food to another apiary. It is a great way to set up multiple divides in an apiary for later transfer.
Queen Isolator
Using plastic queen excluders, Dr. Petr Chmara developed the Chmara Isolator. Creating a frame size isolation cage with two queen excluders spaced 1 cm apart, this apparatus was designed to both stop brood production to control varroa (and potentially other devastating parasitic mites) and to preserve resources (both bees and food) in the Fall and Winter months. A recently published study in Poland examined 78 colonies where the queen was isolated from October to the first cleansing flights in late Winter (5-6 months). They compared queen survivability and Spring brood production (Gabka et al., 2025). There were no significant differences (1 queen lost in isolator colonies and 2 lost in the control colonies) in queen survival. A 25 percent increase in brood production was observed in the queen isolator colonies compared to the control colonies.
Queen Rearing
A queen excluder is a critical piece of equipment in queen rearing. If you maintain a queenright cell building colony, you need a queen excluder. Placed above the queenright deep, the excluder keeps the queen away from the queen cells that are being finished by the workers. Queenright finishing colonies need intense management to prevent swarming, you might need to move brood frames out of these colonies instead of finding frames of brood to stock a queenless finishing colony.
Mouse Excluder
If you are a beekeeper who is challenged with equipment storage space and your Winter pests are limited to mice, a metal queen excluder might keep your frames from being used as a mouse house. Placed at the base of equipment stacks over a bottom board (yes, there are better options!), a queen excluder can also exclude unwanted winter visitors.
BBQ Grill
Long apiary work days have caused nutrition challenged beekeepers to seek out pollen patties as snacks. Pollen substitute might be the dinner of a desperate beekeeper whereas the innovative beekeepers see the queen excluder as a BBQ set up tool. A queen excluder grill is an inspiration to all hungry beekeepers. While we can’t guarantee the safety of excluder grilling, we definitely appreciate the effort.
Next time the subject of queen excluders comes up, maybe we can all agree that regardless of their role in our own operations, they do deserve a bit of respect for their multipurpose function.
References and Resources
Adgaba, N., Al-ghamdi, A. A., Hailu, M., Shenkute, A. G., Ansari, M. J., Hepburn, H. R., & Radloff, S. E. (2013). Queen excluders enhance honey production in African honey bees, Apis mellifera, by limiting brood rearing during peak nectar flow. Journal of Apicultural Research, 52(5), 184–189. https://doi.org/10.3896/IBRA.1.52.5.02
Atkins, E. L., Grout, R. A., & Dadant & Sons. (1975). The Hive and the honey bee : a new book on beekeeping which continues the tradition of “Langstroth on the hive and the honeybee” (Extensively rev.). Dadant.
Bundschuh, J., Mandt, G., Meischner, T., Keller, J., Bornhütter, R., Page, L., Brock, C., & Geier, U. (2026). Extended honey quality assessment with complementary methods enables the assessment of effects of queen excluders in beekeeping management practices. Biological Agriculture & Horticulture, 1–21. https://doi.org/10.1080/01448765.2025.2604107
Bundschuh, J., Rappel, H., Bock, A., Balleisen, U., Daiser, M., Friedmann, G., König, W., Miltenberger, T., Müller, M., Müller, R., Poeplau, N., Roosen, A., Schlotter, A., Sedlmair, C., Weiler, M., Thewes, C., & Brock, C. (2024). Effects of queen excluders on the colony dynamics of honeybees (Apis mellifera L.) under biodynamic management. Apidologie, 55(1), Article 16. https://doi.org/10.1007/s13592-023-01041-9
Gąbka, J., Gąbka, J., & Zajdel, B. (2025). Effect of Autumn and Winter Brood Interruption on Queen Survivability and Spring Development of Honey Bee (Apis mellifera L.) Colonies with Use of Chmara Isolator. Journal of Apicultural Science, 69(1), 63–66. https://doi.org/10.2478/jas-2025-0006
Geier, U., Büssing, A., Kruse, P., Greiner, R., & Buchecker, K. (2016). Development and application of a test for food-induced emotions. PLoS One, 11(11), e0165991.
Gerstmeier, D., & Miltenberger, T. (2018). Ökologische Bienenhaltung: Die Orientierung am Bien. Kosmos.
Junus, M. (2019). The influence of queen bee age, the number of brood combs, and the use of a queen excluder on comb brood size in Apis mellifera bees during the blossom season. BULGARIAN JOURNAL OF AGRICULTURAL SCIENCE, 25(6), 1271–1276.
Prinyawiwatkul, W. (2023). Food-Evoked Emotion, Product Acceptance, Food Preference, Food Choice and Consumption: Some New Perspectives. Foods, 12(11), 2095. https://doi.org/10.3390/foods12112095
Helpful Websites
https://www.beeequipment.eu/queen-isolator
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Petro_Prokopovych
https://thewalrusandthehoneybee.com/the-ever-popular-demaree-method-revisited/
