Liquid petroleum jelly 1L

01 · WHAT IT IS FOR

Everything that seizes up in the honey house

A lot of season breakdowns are not bad luck: they are want of lubrication. Valves that stiffen and end up dripping, gaskets that dry out, threads that seize on the big day of extraction. It goes on with a brush, a syringe or a sprayer over gaskets, threads, catches and shafts of extractors, ripeners, settling tanks, pumps and creamers: it works into the thread, does not go rancid, does not taint the honey and makes stripping down for cleaning easier.

02 · NOT THE ONE FOR COUNTING MITES

The tray takes the stringy kind

If you have an open mesh floor and want to count natural drop, this is not it. The liquid kind shifts with any tilt of the hive and carries the mites out of place, so you lose the information about where they fell — which is what tells you the part of the nest the trouble is in. The stringy kind stays put where you spread it and holds up better through summer without turning runny.

03 · MIXED WITH BEESWAX, FOR WOOD

The use we get asked about most

It is the question this page gets most: yes, it is the usual base for the classic wax-and-oil treatment that protects the wood of hives, frames and tools. Melt it in a bain-marie, roughly one part beeswax to three or four of paraffin, and apply it warm on dry wood. If you need written proof of food-contact suitability, ask us about the grade of the batch before ordering.

04 · OTHER USES ROUND THE APIARY

Ants, rust and cuffs

Smeared on hive stand legs it makes a slippery barrier that holds ants back, and it serves as a sliding surface in the trays of some Aethina tumida traps. On metal threads, hinges and catches it keeps rust and propolis from locking them. And on wrists and ankles, before you put the suit on, it makes it harder for a bee to work its way up a cuff — not infallible, but it helps.

05 · BEFORE YOU BUY

A 1-litre bottle, which lasts several seasons used sparingly and locally. It does not replace the specific grease a machine maker calls for.