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The honeycomb is constructed of hexagonal cells made
of beeswax and has two purposes: to store food (honey and pollen)
and as a nursery for new bees.
To produce one pound of wax the bees need to consume about six to
ten pounds of honey. The beeswax is secreted by glands on the bee's
abdomen. The bees removes the flakes of wax and mold it into shape
using its mandibles.
When a cell is used for raising brood, the cell is always left with
some cocoon debris from the pupa stage of development. This debris
makes the comb appear to be dark, but the wax itself is not
significantly affected. When the cell is cleaned after each
generation of brood, the cell walls are coated with a secretion
called propolis which also contributes to the darkening of the comb.
When a cell is used for only for honey storage, the color of the
comb remains bright and cells full of honey are capped with fresh
beeswax. Cells used to store pollen can be stained by the colors of
the pollen.
The bees will usually alternately use combs for brood rearing or
food storage. A comb often will be used for both purposes
simultaneously. You can get an idea of how all this looks by going
to my webpage at www.nay.org/bee_life.htm.
Usually, when honey is harvested, the wax caps are shaved off with a
hot knife, then the honey is removed from the comb by centrifugal
force. The empty comb can then be replaced into the hive to be
refilled. The wax caps removed in this harvesting process are
salvaged. Likewise, when a comb is damaged, the beekeeper will
salvage that wax as well. This salvaged wax is often a mess with
dead bees, some honey, pollen, cocoon debris, other insects, and
maybe even a mouse or two.
This mess needs to be purified in order to obtain usable wax. But,
we want to do so in a way that is safe and which preserves all the
qualities given to it by nature including aroma, color, texture,
strength, etc.
Beeswax melts at about 64C (147F). To preserve the aroma of fresh
wax it should never be raised more than a few degrees above the
melting point and then only for a short period. I like to melt
beeswax at about 155F-160F. If cooled quickly it will become pale in
color, more brittle and liable to develop cracks due to rapid
contraction. For this reason, wax should be cooled as slowly as
possible to preserve the texture and color.
Never place a pan of wax directly on a stove. Beeswax can easily
become damaged by localized overheating and if it ignites can burn
ferociously. Beeswax does not boil - it just gets hotter and hotter
until it ignites.
Perhaps the most common method of rendering beeswax is to use a
water-bath (double-boiler) by placing the container of wax -
probably a small saucepan - inside a larger pan of water. Wax is
best melted in stainless steel, plastic, or tin-plated containers. I
use an old stainless steel pot (about 3-gallon size) purchased at a
local thrift store. Iron rust and containers of galvanized iron,
brass aluminum and copper all impart a color to beeswax.
I use an alternative to the water-bath process just described. This
process uses only one pot. In my 3-gallon pot I pour about a gallon
hot water, then add the old combs and wax cappings. Maintain heat at
155F-160F until the melted wax and most of the debris are floating
on top of the water. Here's a caution with the
wax-directly-in-the-water method: if you let the water boil, you
darken the wax and otherwise degrade its quality, have water bubbles
mixed in your wax, and the bubbling water will spatter wax around the
stove.
Once the wax has melted, some of the debris will float on top of the
wax; some of the debris will be at the boundary between the water
and the wax; and some debris will settle to the bottom of the water.
Skim off the debris that floats on top of the wax, then let the wax
cool slowly. Once it has solidified, you can remove the wax cake
from the pot. You'll find that there will be a layer of debris on
the bottom of the cake that will need to be scrapped off. You'll
lose some wax in this debris-scraping process, but what is left will
be ready to use as bullet lube, candles, bowstring wax, etc. If
you've used my wax-directly-in-the-water method, you'll find this
scrapping step quite a bit easier and with less wasted wax than with
the double-boiler method. The wax-soaked debris makes a good
fire-starter or material for the compost pile. The dirty water is
even good for the lawn or garden (after it cools, of course).
Here's a labor-saving variation of the wax-directly-in-the-water
method: Put your combs and cappings in a suitably sized bag of
coarse material such as burlap. Add a brick or rock so you can keep
the entire bag submerged below the water level. When you heat the
water, the wax will melt and flow through the bag while the debris
is trapped inside. The clean wax will float to the top -- and no
skimming required! When you you've rendered all the wax, cool the
pot slowly until the wax solidifies. It will likely need no further
cleaning. However, don't squeeze or poke the bag in an effort to
coax more wax out of the bag -- this will only dislodge debris
particles which will contaminate your carefully cleaned wax. |
