Lesson 49: Honey Supers and the Queen Excluder

Giving the bees room for honey, and keeping brood out of your harvest

Honey supers are the boxes where bees store the surplus honey that you harvest (lesson 17). Putting them on at the right time, and enough of them, is one of the biggest factors in how much honey you get. It also helps prevent swarming (lesson 48).

When to add supers

• Before the main nectar flow starts. Management is scheduled around the flows. The goal is a colony at full strength just as the flow begins, with room to store the nectar as surplus rather than using it for build-up. Your Seasonal Guide says when flows usually come in your area.
• When the top box is about three-quarters full, add another super. Then another, and another, as needed.
• Give plenty of room during the flow. Extension guides advise adding plenty of supers to hold incoming nectar and the large bee population. Extra space stimulates foraging and limits late-season swarming.
• Don't make the bees wait for space. A colony that runs out of room in a flow will backfill the brood nest with nectar and may swarm.

Where to put them

• Supers go above the brood chamber (above the queen excluder if you use one).
• A super of foundation (not yet drawn into comb): put it directly above the brood nest, below any supers that already have drawn comb. The bees draw out foundation fastest right above the brood.
• Supers with foundation need a full 10 frames, pushed together, so bees draw straight comb (lesson 19).
• Supers of drawn comb can hold 8 or 9 frames, evenly spaced. The bees draw the comb thicker, which makes uncapping easier at harvest.

The queen excluder

A queen excluder is a grid with gaps just big enough for workers to pass, but too small for the queen (or drones). Placed between the brood chamber and the supers, it keeps the queen from laying eggs in your honey supers, so you harvest clean honey without brood.

Excluders are optional, and beekeepers disagree about them:

• For: they keep brood out of the honey supers, making harvest simpler and cleaner. Many beginner guides recommend one.
• Against: some beekeepers find the bees are slower to move up through an excluder into empty supers. The UGA Bee Program notes an excluder is usually not necessary when two brood boxes are used, because the queen generally stays below.

A common compromise: use an excluder once the bees are working the supers, or leave it off with a two-box brood nest and watch for brood creeping upward.

Always remove the excluder before winter. The winter cluster moves up through the hive, and the queen can be stranded below the excluder and die (lesson 14).

Things to avoid while supers are on

• Don't feed sugar syrup while honey supers are on the hive. The bees can store it in the supers, and your honey won't be pure (lesson 39).
• Don't use mite treatments while supers are on unless the product label allows it (lesson 57).

What to remember

• Add supers before the main flow, and add another when the top one is ¾ full. Give plenty of room.
• Foundation supers go right above the brood, with 10 frames; drawn supers can take 8–9.
• A queen excluder keeps brood out of honey. It's optional; opinions differ. Remove it before winter.
• No syrup, and no mite treatments unless the label allows, while supers are on.

Quick check

1. When should you add another honey super?
2. Where do you place a super of new foundation?
3. Why must the queen excluder come off before winter?

Adapted from: UGA Bee Program, Getting Started: Honey Bee Management and Beekeeping Equipment; University of Arkansas, Complete Beekeeping Short Course, Parts 2, 7 and 8; Purdue Extension, Learning About Beekeeping (4-H-1057-W) and Advanced Beekeeping (4-H-1059-W); Montana State University Extension, Housing Honey Bees; UF/IFAS Extension, Overwintering Honey Bee Colonies (IN1006).

Adapted from university Extension sources. Experienced Georgia beekeepers are reviewing these lessons. See something that doesn't match your experience? Tell us.