Impressions on plastic vs metal bound queen excluders-a Canadian Beekeeper’s Blog 

You can fix those plastic excluders by turning them into a wooden bound excluder. Take an old crappy brood box, set your table saw to 3/8 inch and run it thru, turning 1 tall box into a bunch of small / short boxes 3/8 inches tall. Lay it on the table, and run a bead of gorilla glue (polyurethane glue) all the way around. Set the plastic excluder on it run another bead of glue and place a second 3/8 piece on top. Staple it together with ¾ in staples or brads. Clamp them for 24 hours to cure. You just turned a wimpy plastic excluder into a really good wood bound excluder. If you place a scrap of 3/8 plywood under the excluder while you staple the wood edges in place, you can hold it flat and take the warp / bend out of it. It also gives a bee space above and below the excluder, so the will pass thru easier and no propolis it up so bad.

I love this guy! He has answers to all my beekeeping questions. Much appreciated!

Aside from trying to understand my bees, my problem is that it took RU-vid over a year of me watching beekeeping videos before suggesting yours to me. Thank you for the valuable insight into your operation. Keep um coming, please.

Completely agree! We were putting on bee escapes prior to harvest this summer, having to Lift heavy supers and the blasted plastic excluders always stuck to the top of the underneath of the super! Only when someone else points it out you have that lightbulb moment! Thanks for the video!!

"These damn things", tells you all you need to know right there!

Thanks! That is my impression too. It works just fine, but has it's limitations. I use both. Just to be able to compare. I hope to se you 2022😉 at the beeconference. Lot's of love from Sweden! Happy hollidays!

Totally agree. Also I found the plastic ones if you have a lot of bees on it and its a little cooler out, say early spring, you tend to fling those bees all about as the plastic pops away from the box. This does not lead to very happy bees. 😆 I like how fast and easy it is to clean the metal ones right in the field very quickly with a quick hit of my torch I use for my smoker. 2 min, done.

Good to hear that you had luck with them! We really didn't find them to work since the width of the holes were larger than the metal units. Id love to stamp my own if I had a machine! I have about 350 left that i'd let go for 2 bucks each!! heh. I do need to get those in the ABJ at some point...

Great presentation. I don't like plastic either anymore. Plastic may warp so much in heat, that queen can get through.

I have the impression that you have minimal problems with propolis in your hives. Is this due to absence of pine trees perhaps in the prairie environment, or have you bred the tendency to propolise out of your queens, which incidentally seem to create colonies that are remarkably gentle when you handle them. Your videos are always extremely interesting and often thought provoking. Many thanks for all your efforts.

Lots of good info,thanks for your time

Thanks for your opinion, I'll rather use metal excluders! Cape Town; South Africa!

once your time making these videos is appreciated.

Do you think the queen excluder is shortening the life span of the bees or affecting the amount of honey? I am also running single broods

it would be interesting to know about your beekeeper quebec

My queen didn’t lay eggs in the bottom 2 brood boxes instead she lay eggs on the top honey super 😞 because I didn’t use a queen excluder. What do I do?

Nice video's!! I have heard putting a smear of petroleum jelly around the wall Edge helps prevent sticking as much.

Hello, what kind of boxes do you use on hives? Why do you use only one box down and not two? Thank you!

can you use number 6 metal wiring to make a queen excluder stapled to a wood frame?

Can they be used as a cheap propolis collector? Much less expensive.

The metal ones come out excellent from a dishwasher. Twenty at a time.

good insight, Thanks!

I like the metal better too.

Plastic queen ex. Not good as my expirence