Most people have heard of beeswax but may not be too sure what it is, how it’s made, or what it’s for.

Worker honey bees secrete wax from glands under their abdomen, and given the thousands of bees in an active colony and enough time, substantial quantities can be produced. The bees use it as a building material, crafting it into the familiar hexagonal “honeycomb” arrangements that so efficiently make up individual containers for pollen, honey or larvae.

To make life easier for the beekeepers, most people “prime” their frames with a sheet of preformed wax that even has slight bumps to help the bees with their geometry. This “foundation” wax comes in standard size sheets and slots into the wooden frames, encouraging the bees to fill the corners of the frames and maximise storage space.

Combs of honey are “capped” with a layer of wax when they’re at the right consistency, and when the beekeeper extracts the wax the comb is usually damaged beyond re-use by the bees. However brood comb is cleaned out by the bees after a young worker emerges, can can be re-used. Eventually however the comb becomes worn, damaged and discoloured. To ensure good quality, healthy comb beekeepers periodically replace old comb, both brood and honey. The simplest way to do this is to use a “solar extractor”. This is a simple, eco-friendly device like a tiny greenhouse. Trapping the sun’s heat under glass the temperature can quickly rise and melt the wax of any old frames placed inside. It trickles down inside and collects in a tray at the bottom. Then the beekeeper can remove it and either use it directly themselves, or sell it back to the foundation manufacturer who will filter, clean and sterilise it before re-forming it into foundation.

The recent hot weather has provided ideal opportunity to melt down some old comb, clean up the wooden frames and refit new foundation. This is just another of the many “housekeeping” tasks that can take quite a time but helps to ensure that our bees stay healthy, and achieves that in an eco-friendly way without any waste.