Garry Libby, who is an excellent beekeeper in Eastern Mass., commented on the potential disadvantage of using three mediums as a brood chamber. He also wondered if one Modified Dadant hive body would hold enough honey to allow the bees to over winter in the Northeast. Yes, I suppose having thirty frames to go through when examining the brood nest is more work than twenty (deep and a medium or two deeps), and certainly more work than twelve (Modified Dadant). However, how often would one really have to examine all brood frames? For example, my sole brood nest setup is a deep and a medium, with the medium on the bottom. Right now I am in the midst of finding 40 over-wintered queens to replace them with year 2000 queens in my hives I will use for comb honey production. I find those queens by first putting a queen excluder between the two hive bodies, waiting at least 4 days, and then looking only in the hive body that has eggs. I really don't look inside the other hive body at all. To my way of thinking right now (and my thinking is different at age 60 than it was at age 50), three mediums would be worth the disadvantages having to do with higher cost and more frames. As to using only a Modified Dadant (and Dadant also still makes frames as well as foundation) for over-wintering here in the Northeast, I have no doubt that the 90 pounds of honey in such a single chamber would be more than enough for bees to over winter on. In fact, I have done just that on many occasions. However, there is another consideration and that is swarming. As I get older, and hopefully wiser, I keep finding more reasons to listen to the old timers. Often they are right in their advice, although their reasoning may be doubtful. For example, for many years I have railed against the custom of over wintering in two deeps, maintaining that a deep and a medium provides more than enough honey, and pointing out that manipulating two deeps is work that is too heavy. The old timers say that the added honey from two deeps is necessary...and they are wrong about that. However, they might be right on the frame space required! Almost two solid weeks of rain in mid-late April, combined with several days of 60-70 degree temperatures in early April, have led to severe swarming problems in my area of the country. Sure, my deep and medium setup had more than enough honey for over wintering and maintaining the brood expansion, but left little room for error in timing and I am now facing real swarming pressure. Another medium of brood space would have at least somewhat relieved the pressure on the brood nest. So perhaps a good reason for over wintering in two deeps is that swarm control becomes less critical in springs such as this one. When I over wintered in only a Modified Dadant I had significant problems with swarming as the brood nest was just too small. I tried to combat that by using a Jumbo and a matching super (the super on the bottom), and that worked. However, I gave it up as I could not buy more Jumbos or matching supers, and I didn't want to run both Langstroth and Jumbos. Lloyd Lloyd Spear, Owner, Ross Rounds, Inc. The finest in comb honey production. www.rossrounds.com