>My books say to use a queen excluder, but by reading some of the posts on this forum I see some do not use them.
I'd say MANY do not use them. :)
> As a new guy, can you tell me about not using an excluder?
Just say no.
>What are the benefits?
More honey, less swarming, less wear and tear on the bees squeezing through the excluder.
>How high does the queen lay?
As high as she wants. Which, of course, is a good thing. The more she lays the more bees and the more bees the more honey and the more room she has to lay the less swarming.
>Does that present any logistics problem when it comes time to extract?
Since I run all the same size boxes, none at all for me. I pull them a frame at a time and brush off the bees. If there's brood I put it back in the hive and take a frame of honey instead. When I didn't have the same sized boxes, I still didn't use an excluder, but it was more complicated. I had to either cut the brood out, if it was a small patch, or put all those odd frames of brood together on the weakest hive.
>What are the negatives to using an excluder?
Swarming, hard to get them to work the supers, less honey.
>Is there any different hive managment when not using the excluder vs. using one?
You have to think about the fact that drones can't get through the excluder, if you use one. The drones have to be able to get out. If you add an excluder with no top entrance you could trap drones in the supers. If you add an excluder with no botom entrance, you could trap the drones in the bottom. In order to get the bees to work through the excluder, you again, need to have the same sized frames so you can bait them up through the excluder with a couple of frames of brood above it. Without an excluder, baiting them up is a moot point.