Michael, I like your way of stacking the supers on a bottom board between escapes. Few concers: if the supers are from different hives, do they ever fight? The other one: has it ever happend that you took the queen in a super? Ten days ago I put queen excluder on top of two deeps to separate the third one which had some brood ready to hatch and some ampty spaces, and almost full shallow on top. I didn't want her to lay in that deep. She is laying where ever she founds the space. I checked the deep before, but I couldn't find her so I shook the bees off, put the excluder the deep, and than the shallow super almost full of honey. . I came from vacation, and checked on them. And gues what. All third deep was beautifuly full of brood, instead of honey. She must have been in the shallow super which I didn't check.