POINTS ABOUT BEESWAX
HOW TO MAKE IT
Beeswax is a unique product; the little socialists of the hive have
formed a trust for its manufacture, which for many and good reasons
has never been infringed upon. The special value of beeswax is that it
retains its cohesiveness and ductibility, under both higher and lower
temperatures, than do other kinds of wax. It has a specific gravity of
960–972, and melts at 143–145° F.
Beeswax has been in demand in the world since ancient times, being put
to many and diverse uses. Now, however, the making of foundation-comb
is the most important of these uses and most affects the beeswax
market of to-day. Countless thousands of sheets of wax foundation are
manufactured yearly in America. When foundation was first used it was
thought that it might be adulterated safely with paraffine, but it was
soon found that beeswax thus adulterated, when subjected to the heat of
the hive in summer, would invariably bulge, buckle and sag. We know an
apiarist who lost money, honey, bees and temper through trying to use
this kind of foundation, which did not stand firm.
[Illustration: PLATE XX
_Photographs by Verne Morton_
Drawing honey from extractor. The honey is strained through a fine wire
strainer set in the top of the pail.
Pouring extracted honey into keg for shipping in bulk.]
[Illustration: PLATE XXI
Extracted honey in pails—candied
_Photographs by Verne Morton_
Extracted honey in glass jars ready for market.]
THE PRIMITIVE METHOD
The process of making wax from honey-comb may be primitive and yet
quite successful. Well do we remember the method as practised in the
days of our early youth in the kitchen of the old farmhouse, usually a
comfortable and altogether delightful room. Its yellow-painted floor
seemed to have caught the sunshine streaming in through white-curtained
windows and held it there for us to tread upon. The chintz-covered
settee and Boston rockers, and a few widths of bright rag carpet, made
one end a cozy sitting-room. At the opposite end the cupboards, their
shelves covered with elaborately scalloped newspapers, and beset with
orderly dishes and tinware, bespoke the kitchen. Midway between stood
the heavy cherry drop-leaf table which revealed the dining-room; in
the midst of this Protean apartment stood the cook-stove, polished so
that it would put to shame the rosewood case of a piano, bearing on its
top the pink-copper tea-kettle singing gayly after its daily bath of
cleansing buttermilk, and holding within the roaring fire which ever
seemed the spirit and soul of the place. The neatness that held sway
in this kitchen was the perfect sort that conduces to comfort, and not
to misery. Only at certain periods was this delectable room given over
to discomfort and untidiness; these included “wash-days,” the days
following the yearly sacrificial rite of butchering and the days when
beeswax was made.
We were wont to make beeswax as follows: The broken combs were packed
in a muslin bag which was weighted by a sinker and hung in the
wash-boiler by tying the bag to the poker, which was placed crosswise
the top. By this contrivance the bag was completely surrounded by
water, which filled the boiler, and yet did not touch the bottom, and
so there was no danger of burning; the cloth acted as a strainer and
the bag was pressed occasionally; this act being judiciously performed
by means of the tongs, which had previously been cleaned. After the wax
had boiled out the boiler was taken off and the whole contents cooled,
after which the wax was taken from the top in pieces and remelted in a
dish set on the back side of the stove so as not to burn, then poured
into oiled bread-tins, and thus caked for the market. Some of it was
clarified for special use thus: It was allowed to simmer on the back of
the stove for some hours in water to which vinegar had been added, and
then was dipped off into scalloped patty-tins and a neat little loop of
cord inserted at one side. These cakes when cooled had a long though
scarified existence ensconced in work-baskets with spools of thread,
for wax thus cleaned and prepared made very pretty little gifts for
lady-friends. But the experience of rendering wax was never complete
without spilling some of it on the stove, which spread with fearful
rapidity and smoked with stifling smoke; because of the certainty of
this accident we always made the beeswax in the late fall, lest our
bees regarding the pungent smoke as a direct invitation should come
visiting in embarrassing numbers.
Sundry old pieces of rag carpet were spread on the floor around the
stove to keep the yellow paint intact from the wax, which was so hard
to clean off. We had no benzine in those days, and our only resort was
boiling hot water, which cleaned off the paint as well as the wax.
One privilege that was always granted to us children on this day was
that of having “our fingers made.” As the wax was cooling the finger
was dipped in it, and the film was cooled while the finger was held
very still; then the film was slipped off, a crucial point in the
process, and used as a mould into which was poured the cooling wax; and
presto! there was the finger as natural as life to every crease and
wrinkle, but with a death-like pallor that rendered the row of fingers
thus made a fascinatingly gruesome collection, as if they had been
chopped off with a hatchet.
This old process of rendering wax in the wash-boiler is still practised
where apiaries are small. Mr. Root advises the following modification:
Sticks are placed crosswise the bottom of the boiler on which the bag
is placed; the bag is packed very full of wax by pressing the comb into
balls with the hands before it is put in. Water is added and the whole
is placed upon the stove and brought slowly to a boil, then a board
that acts as a follower on the bag is placed on top with a heavy weight
upon it; this acts as a press and decreases the bulk in the bag,
leaving the wax floating on the surface.
THE SOLAR WAX-EXTRACTOR
There are many modern and up-to-date methods advised for extracting
wax. The most common is through the use of the Solar wax-extractor,
which was invented for extracting honey in California, where the sun
can be depended upon to do its work unflinchingly day after day. There
was more than myth in the story of Icarus who fastened his wings on
with wax, and then dared to face the sun. The ancients evidently knew
that no other substance of the sort is so susceptible to the sun’s
rays. I shall never forget my amazement at the efficiency of the
first Solar extractor that I ever saw; it was home-made and there was
naught in its appearance to indicate its power. The comb was hard and
blackened and full of dirt, while the wax that oozed out and hardened
below was as shining and yellow as if the sun itself had exhaled it.
A Solar extractor ought to be in every apiary where twenty colonies
or more are kept, and into this every fragment of comb should be put
instead of storing it to become infested by the bee-moth, or leaving it
around to incite the bees to robbing. The fragments thus are saved and
without any expense or trouble are made into a beautiful product for
the market.
There are several of these Solar extractors made and sold by dealers.
The Doolittle, the Rauchfuss and the Boardman are the three commonly
used. The Doolittle is small and all right for a small apiary.
The Rauchfuss has a clever arrangement by which the wax in flowing
out overflows from one pan to another and thus cleanses itself
automatically. The Boardman is especially adapted for large apiaries,
and is on rockers so that it may be tilted to face the sun. The general
plan of the Solar wax-extractor is as follows: It consists of a shallow
box lined with sheet-iron on which is a frame for holding the comb
with a strainer below it, and a place where the wax thus extracted is
received. The box has a tight-fitting glass cover, and all the woodwork
on the box is painted black so as to absorb all the heat possible.
The box is tilted so as to get the direct rays of the sun, and it is
important that the cover be of one pane of glass, or several panes
matched without cross sash, as such sash interferes with the rays of
the sun. Here in the East this extractor works excellently during the
summer months. If the wax does not look clean as it comes from the
extractor, it may be put through again. The only difficulty with the
Solar extractor is that here in the East it works only in the summer
time, and that it does not extract all the wax from the refuse which
bears the graphic and euphonious name of “slumgum.”
THE SWISS WAX-EXTRACTOR
There are many patent wax-extractors which are run by the heat of a
stove. The best of these utilise steam for heating the wax, though
some of them use hot water in a sort of a modification of the old
wash-boiler method. The best of these machines for a small apiary is
the Swiss extractor, which may be set over a kettle of hot water, like
an ordinary vegetable steamer, which it resembles. The comb is placed
in a wire basket, which has a cone-shaped bottom, over which the wax
flows down as it melts and drains off through a spout into a pan in
which it is to be caked. This machine costs only three or four dollars
and is simple and excellent; though it takes but comparatively little
comb at a time, it keeps up a continual performance and there is no
danger whatever of burning the wax. The basket may be replenished from
time to time, and a large amount of wax may be extracted in a day while
other work is being performed in the room. Mr. Root has an improved
Swiss extractor and so has Mr. D. A. Jones, and both of them are most
satisfactory. Mr. Jones’s machine is the larger and may be used as an
uncapping can as well; the cappings when taken off falling directly
into the extractor.
THE WAX-PRESS
Wax is such a precious product in these days of the manufacture of
foundation-comb that every particle of it should be saved. This is
quite impossible with any of the extractors; as the slumgum always
holds much wax, to extract which a wax-press is needed. All wax-presses
are necessarily rather expensive machines when bought, and not very
easily manufactured at home. In some of them the comb is melted by
steam and in some by hot water; in others the heated wax is dipped from
a kettle of hot water and poured into the press.
The German steam wax-press is in general use in America, Mr. Root
having an improvement on it. It is a strongly built can, at the bottom
of which is a place for water, and above it an arrangement to receive
the wax drippings. A basket of perforated metal holds the comb and
occupies the larger and upper part of the can; a follower worked by a
screw presses down upon the heated comb and forces the wax down and out
through a spigot. This machine weighs sixty pounds and costs fourteen
dollars, and if the apiary contains more than forty hives of bees, such
a wax-press will pay for itself soon with the wax which would otherwise
be lost.
We have seen one home-made press constructed from a half barrel worked
by the machinery of a cheese-press. The follower was cleated on the
under side, and the barrel was filled with boiling water; the wax as
it was pressed out was run off by a spout at the top. Another which
was used successfully was simply a box with cleated bottom and a
cleated follower into which the hot wax was poured and pressed out
most successfully. One of the wax presses used by many is called the
Hatch-Gemmill press, which is run on the principle of dipping the hot
wax off hot water and squeezing it through the press.
REFINING WAX WITH SULPHURIC ACID
On a small scale this may be done in an agate or porcelain-lined
kettle. Mr. Root even advises on occasion the use of a large iron
kettle. The kettle is filled half full of water, 100 parts to one part
acid, and is brought nearly to the boiling point over a slow fire; the
wax is then added and is kept hot for a little time after it is melted,
and then the fire is allowed to die down; as soon as it is cool enough
so that the dirt has settled, the wax is dipped off, great care being
taken not to stir up the settlings. If an iron kettle is used it should
afterward be thoroughly washed with boiling water, and rubbed with
fresh lard or some other unsalted grease to stop the action of the acid
upon it. Beeswax may be bleached by exposing it in thin sheets to the
sunlight.
ADULTERATED BEESWAX
Dishonest dealers have attempted to adulterate beeswax with several
substances; tallow, paraffine and cerasin being more commonly used.
Tallow or other greasy adulterants may be detected by the smell; and
because the cakes of wax containing them feel and look greasy. But
paraffine and cerasin are not so easily detected by the eye or feel.
The specific gravity test is the one used by dealers. A piece of wax
known to be pure is placed in a jar of water, and enough alcohol is
added so that the wax will just settle to the bottom. Then a piece of
the suspected wax is placed in the jar, and if it contains either
paraffine or cerasin it will still float. Another test but not so exact
is made by chewing the wax; if it is pure it will be brittle and break
as it is chewed, but adulterated wax is cohesive like gum.
MAXIMS FOR BEESWAX MAKING
The wax-market is always good, and the wise bee-keeper saves every
scrap of this precious material.
Do not be mussy when making beeswax, or it will take longer to clean up
than to make the wax.
Do not use galvanised iron vessels for boiling wax as the quality is
thus injured.
Clean wax off with hot water or benzine.