Harvesting Propolis

It's all over your frames, boxes, and hive tool (and if you're like me, also your phone!). Why not clean that gear up and harvest this highly valuable hive product at the same time?

Here is a short video on how we harvest propolis without using a propolis mat, and without removing any from the brood boxes where the bees need it most.

We only harvest propolis from the honey supers. You may want to do this even if you don't plan on making propolis products (yet) because it will help everything fit together much better next spring!

Before we uncap, we scrape all of the propolis off of each frame (you'll have lots of it, especially if you use 9 frames in your honey boxes). We also scrap the ledge inside each box where a lot of it tends to accumulate, and any that is built up on the sides of the box.

A tincture only requires 1 part propolis to 10 parts alcohol so it doesn't take much to produce something very valuable and beneficial!

This book has some good recipes for propolis as well as other hive products!