brood in super, what to do?

[james]

Just looked in one of the hives we have and it was very full, i noticed that there was brood in the top super (there are 2 supers), not sure how that happened. I remember in the early spring i removed a few frames form the brood and replaced them with foundation to prevent swarming i am wondering if a queen was moved with those frames though i remember making sure no bees were on the frames i moved to the super. What should i do???

[hankdog1]

Simple as can be make sure the queen isn't up in your super and slip a queen excluder under the super.  That way you don't kill the brood.  Oooh yeah since it sounds like you don't use queen excuders which i don't except in that situation remove it after the brood hatches. 

[Robo]

Or just make sure she has plenty of room to lay in the brood area,  and she will move back down because the bees will backfill the area in the top super as the brood hatches which will prevent her from laying there.

If you do the excluder route, make sure there is an upper entrance for drones to exit,  otherwise they are trapped and will die and clog up the excluder.

Nothing really to worry about, worst case if you want to havest is just leave the frames with brood as part of the bees share.

[hankdog1]

Thanks for adding in about the top hive entrance Robo.  Sometimes the old mind gets a little ahead of myself and i forget a detail here or there.

[D Coates]

I found when I went the queen excluder route with an upper entrance they made new queens up there.  I posted what I found on another website about this and was told by a few who replied that this is normal.  Some of them requeen in this manner.  Once there a good laying queen in the upper portion they pinch the old one in the lower and leave the excluder on for 3 or 4 more days.  After that that remove the excluder and let the new queen move down.  I tried it on purpose once this year and it worked like a charm.

If you're not wanting to make a queen in the upper and you go the excluder route make sure there no upper entrance for a week or so.  You can put an upper entrance after that as any eggs up there will be too old to turn into a queen.