Brood in the Honey Super

[beek4018]

Well I was in for a surprise today...

I went out to check on my girls ( hadn't seen them in two weeks for various reasons).

Last I checked there was plenty of brood and capped stores in the two deeps, and the one honey super was about 80% drawn out with honey beginning to be stored in about 2-3 frames. No frames were anywhere near full.

Today I find the honey super completely drawn out, and 5-6 frames on one side are mostly full of capped honey ( great, that's what I hoped for).  but the other 4-5 frames had some capped honey and larva/brood in about 40-60% of the frame.  $^*. I have a queen excluder in place.

I do have vague memories of accidentally restacking the honey super at the end of one inspection and forgetting the excluder ( but I remembered and replaced it within in literally a minute). Could she really have migrated up into the honey super that quickly?  I know the answer is yes, but what are the odds she was sitting on the top bar waiting, and thinking "Come on you stinking biped forget the excluder, just this once.  Yes. I'm free!!!"

Am I really THAT unlucky?

Upon further inspection I discovered that the top deep had almost no brood or larva, but plenty of stores, including one full frame of nothing but capped honey.  The lack of brood isn't good, but the honey should help in winter.

I didn't look in the lower deep as it was 90 degrees out and I wasn't really sure what I was looking for.

I put the excluder back in place ( for what that's worth) and restacked the super.  I then spent some time looking for the queen (with no luck).

My questions are these:

1. Can queens squeeze through excluders, or are there more likely scenarios ( my mistake with the excluder, etc.) and what are they?

2. Are some excluders better than others?  I'm using a Kelley metal excluder.

3. Is it possible I've got a laying worker in the honey super?  I didn't see a lot of drone brood in the deep super I checked, and none in the honey super.

4. How do I get the queen back downstairs into the deeps, and keep her there?

5. Can I just brush all the bees off of the honey super frames and restack the box?

6.Since things are almost full ( of honey and brood) in the honey super do I need to worry about overcrowding and add another super? This seems unwise given the brood issues right now. I assume I label overcrowding a second order problem until I get the brood sorted out, correct?

7. Once I get her laying downstairs how long after the brood hatches will it take the house bees to clean those cells and make them available for honey storage?

I know that's a lot, but thanks for hanging with me.  I'm, of course,  a newbie.

-Glenn

[hardwood]

My opinion...take the camping grill...er...excluder off and let the bees work it out. You might have to open the brood nest a little (if it has too much honey/nectar stored there) to encourage the queen to move back down.

Scott

[Kathyp]

ditto the above.

and yes, queens can go through excluders, but if you have trapped her up there, you are going to damage your hive.  i'd remove it. 

as the bees hatch out of your honey supers the workers will backfill with honey.  do check below and make sure there is plenty of room for the queen to lay.

[Michael Bush]

If you're lucky you will forget the exlcuder often...

[alfred]

Ditto with everyone else, Get rid of the excluder!

Then maybe open up some space in the brood area.