# Why is a medium sometimes called an Illinois super?



## beeware10 (Jul 25, 2010)

dadants were the first to push this size super and their located in Illinois.


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## e-spice (Sep 21, 2013)

Thanks beeware10. I had also wondered why they were called Illinois supers.


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## Matt903 (Apr 8, 2013)

Thanks beeware


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## capitalbeesupply (Jul 28, 2013)

I have also heard them referred to as a "3/4" but not sure why..they don't seem to be 3/4 of anything that I could easily identify.......so Illinois super, mediums, 3/4, 6 inch, those are terms I've heard people use for 6-5/8 depth boxes....


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## Michael Bush (Aug 2, 2002)

>I have also heard them referred to as a "3/4" but not sure why..they don't seem to be 3/4 of anything that I could easily identify......

If a deep is a "full" and a 4 3/4" is a "half" and a 5 3/4" is a "shallow" I guess they figure a medium is about 3/4 of the way between a "half" and a "full". But probably the LEAST ambiguous name would be to call it a 6 5/8" super... or maybe, for int'l purposes 168mm super?


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## aunt betty (May 4, 2015)

Someone in Illinois developed the medium depth super is what I was told 35 years ago when I asked this question. 
Possibly someone from The University of Illinois. 
Deeps were too heavy and shallows were too much work. (for someone)


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## jim lyon (Feb 19, 2006)

I've always assumed they got the "Illinois" nickname because their popularity required other suppliers to sell them but those suppliers hated to directly mention the name of their competitor (Dadant) in their catalogs.


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## Michael Bush (Aug 2, 2002)

>I've always assumed they got the "Illinois" nickname because their popularity required other suppliers to sell them but those suppliers hated to directly mention the name of their competitor (Dadant) in their catalogs.

I think you hit it on the head. Also, it caught on in Illinois perhaps before other locations because of Dadant.


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## aunt betty (May 4, 2015)

Been trying to find anything anywhere that says who invented it or why.

What I did find is that medium depth supers can be used as brood chambers but shallows...not too good an idea.The cluster is too big and would be divided by the bars. I think maybe this had something to do with whoever developed the Illinois depth super. 
Probably someone who hurt their back started this and to this day people with back troubles are going to 8 frame and/or Illinois depth.


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## Michael Bush (Aug 2, 2002)

The inventor would be Camille Pierre Dadant.

"The experiment was made on a large number of hives both with the deep brood-chambers and the Langstroth hives. With the former the matter was settled at once. The brood combs were altogether too large to be used in a super. There was too much danger of heavy combs breaking down, when full of honey, too much trouble in extracting. Besides, a deep super seemed to attract the queen, when a shallow super did not. With the Langstroth brood chambers, the objections to a deep upper story were not so flagrant; yet they appeared to us quite sufficient to condemn it. There was often too much room at the time, so much so that a number of people who double the size of their brood-chamber, previous to the honey crop, often think it necessary to add the second story at the bottom, instead of the top. Then these combs were not so handy as those that we adopted at that time, for extracting combs, with the advice of Mr. Langstroth. Shallow frames, such as have been offered by dealers, are too shallow. Those that we use are of the right size to be uncapped at one stroke of the knife and yet they contain nearly 100 square inches of comb, or over two thirds of the capacity of a standard Langstroth brood-frame. Although we have often heard beekeepers say that they could not tolerate two different sizes of frames in their apiary, we find less objection to these extracting combs than any one can find to the use of sections for comb honey.

"The fact that bees prefer large combs in which to store their honey, instead of small boxes, has been also determined by beekeepers in many sections. In Texas, especially, many beekeepers produce what is called "bulk honey or chunk honey," honey in large combs which is cut out of the frames and marketed in tins, with a sufficient amount of extracted honey to fill the interstices between the cut combs. During a visit the writer made in Southern Texas, he was told that beekeepers could expect one third more honey from their bees, in large combs running the full length of the hive, than in small receptacles. This he believed readily, for the assertion was in agreement with his own experience. Aside from the reasons invoked by Oliver Foster, mentioned in a previous paragraph, regarding the habits of the bees, the long comb in the super is more easily reached by the workers, is more easily ventilated, and more homelike in every way. The colony morale—to use an expressive phrase originated by Geo. S. Demuth—the colony morale is enhanced by such supers, the work with more entrain and often yield much greater results. An experiment made by us upon a number of supers, in which both pound sections and full length combs were used, left us not a shadow of doubt as to the bees' preference. Every practical beekeeper knows that bees begin the storing of honey in the super in that part of it which is nearest to the brood, usually the center of the hive. Placing both full length combs and sections, supplied equally with comb foundation, together in supers, but with the sections in the most favorable part, nearest the brood, we saw the bees invariably begin their storing in the full length combs, although remoter from the brood, and they were filled before the sections were fairly begun. Any experimenter can easily test this himself."--C.P. Dadant, Dadant System of Beekeeping Chapter 2 page 26 "The supers" 1920 edition.


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## waspslayer (Jan 3, 2010)

Folks here on the left coast call the 6 5/8" supers "westerns", go figure.


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## jim lyon (Feb 19, 2006)

Funny, I grew up calling them shallows and we referred to 5 1/2" as "skinnys"


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## Michael Bush (Aug 2, 2002)

>Funny, I grew up calling them shallows and we referred to 5 1/2" as "skinnys"

What was a 4 3/4"?


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## newred (Sep 28, 2014)

Around me people call them "westerns", and when you call them mediums some people don't know what you mean.


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## warrior (Nov 21, 2005)

waspslayer said:


> Folks here on the left coast call the 6 5/8" supers "westerns", go figure.


Westerns are 7 5/8 and Western Bee Supply is the only source I'm aware of. Just me but the one size fits all mindset would be better served by this size if it were commonly available.


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## newred (Sep 28, 2014)

I have tried to tell people that same thing.


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## jim lyon (Feb 19, 2006)

Michael Bush said:


> >Funny, I grew up calling them shallows and we referred to 5 1/2" as "skinnys"
> 
> What was a 4 3/4"?


We didnt have any of those around to name but I remember them because we had a few that were hive body stapled together and used as a deep.


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## aunt betty (May 4, 2015)

Not sure but I think the 4.75" supers are for round section comb honey production. I'd call them rounds probably.


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