Where does beeswax come from and what do we do with it?
Honeybees produce wax from glands on their stomachs, (not my pic, from an educational seminar)
Here are a group of bees working on building new honeycomb
a beautiful new comb coming along nicely
Sun shining through comb, some cells are filled with pollen
Bees will raise brood, store honey and pollen in their beeswax comb
after generations of brood are raised the comb will get darker
old comb is melted down in a huge pot to a mush
I use an old crockpot and cheesecloth to strain out impurities for the second melting
after melting down and straining, the old dark comb is now looking nice
beeswax is melted and poured into molds ready for use in my lip balms and lotions
the finished lip balms and lotions using our own bees' wax as the thickener. Best lotion and lip balm ever! There are many many uses for natural beeswax.