Beeswax in beekeeping

As a company that originates in the beekeeping sector, we are fully aware of the important role that beeswax plays in a healthy beehive. Adulteration with other waxes and harmful residues in beeswax foundations have been identified in thousands of cases as the reason for the decease of a bee family. In countless cases however, the impact of non-suitable beeswax is not even noted by the beekeeper or the negative effects that can be observed in the hive put into relation with the foundations. By lowering the probability of survival of the brood or by only weakening it, the honey harvest and healthiness of a beehive can be seriously diminished. But since there is no official standard for beeswax, how can we make sure that wax or foundations are og high quality? Here are a few general points that you should take into consideration when buying beeswax as a beekeeper:

• Quality standard for beeswax foundations in beekeeping
• How can high quality beeswax be identified? 
• Common declarations of beeswax for beekeeping in the market
• Differences between pesticide types found in beeswax
• Our standard, their definition and quality promise

Quality standard for beeswax foundations in beekeeping

In contrast to honey, there is currently no official beeswax quality standard on EU level. Due to this lack of standartization, industries that utilize beeswax have started to develop quality standards based on their production needs. Best known are the RAL standard by candlemakers and the Ph. Eur. standard from the pharma industry. These do not however reflect same quality requirements that a beekeeper should have towards the foundations in beehives. Since paraffin and stearin are commonly used in candle production anyways and since beeswax candles will burn perfectly well when there is a small percentage of these waxes present, the German institute for quality assurance and labeling decided to allow 18% total hydrocarbons in beeswax while declaring it as 100% pure beeswax. This is however not the case because natural beeswax has a total hydrocarbon content of around 14,5%, if the beeswax has been re-used as brood foundations in the beehive frequently it can go up to 15-15,5%. Still, many suppliers up to this day sell 100% beeswax for use in beekeeping with reference to the RAL standard, which has led to todays situation where “beeswax pools” in most European countries have total hydrocarbons around 16-16,5% on average. This level of adulteration can be considered to be minimal with no or not measurable effect on bees, but we strongly advise against the use of beeswax based on the RAL standard for beekeeping, it is in most cases not suitable for use in hives and beekeepers should always request an analysis from suppliers that proves the quality of the wax and is representative to the respective batch that is being sold.

How can high quality beeswax be identified? 

This leads to the next question that we want to adress – how can we tell if beeswax is of high and suitable quality for beekeeping?
Today, there are many accredited laboratories that offer analysis of beeswax, most of them located in Germany as e.g. Intertek, QSI, Eurofins, FoodQs or Ceralyse. All of them use the same techniques and differences are mostly due to different interpretations of results. To clarify if beeswax is adulterated, Gaschromatography (GC), Nuclear Magnetic Ressonance (NMR), NIR Spektroskopy and the quantification of total hydrocarbons are used. When buying beeswax for beekeeping, it is important to look closely at the analysis resports that should be provided and not take the existence of a report itself as a sign of high quality. Total hydrocarbon analysis alone and/or in combinations with general values like density, melting point and sponification or ester number dot not provide ANY information about the pureness of the offered wax! Instead, total hydrocarbon analysis should always be combined with a GC or NMR report that give a clear indication on the percentage of adulteration that is present in an analyzed wax sample.
The second analysis report that should always be requested from a seller when buying beeswax for beekeeping is residue/pesticide analysis. With these however, differences between the laboratories are much more severe, both in regard to the number of pesticides/insecticides/varroacides beeing analyzed and the limits of quantification (LOQ – the smallest detectable amount of a substance). While some laboratories only look for 15-20 pesticides and insecticides, other can identify over 250+. Similarly, reports from some laboratories only show a positive find of a residues when it is above 0,5mg/kg, others analyze down to 0,1, 0,01 or even 0,001mg/kg. In the last case, the analysis is 500% more accurate then a report with a LOQ of 0,5mg/kg, but limits down to 0,001mg are so low that as a beekeeper, with all reason they can be considered insignificant to bees. So how do we differentiate then, where do we as beekeepers draw the line? In commercial offers many terms can be found that indicate a high quality standard, a few of them we’d like to discuss in the following section.

Common commercial declarations of beeswax for beekeeping

• 100% pure beeswax
• pesticide free
• low on pesticides
• free of varoacides
• organic beeswax

Any beekeeper who has bought beeswax before has surely come across many of these terms that are used for promotion. When we take a closer look at the analysis reports, if any are provided that really are representative and not from a batch from 2 years ago, it becomes clear that these terms are no standard at all and beeswax promoted by them varies significantly in quality. As mentioned before, 100% pureness ofer refers to the RAL standard and is only proven with hydrocarbon analysis and/or a specification of general wax properties like the saponification value and others. A declaration as pesticide free depends heavily on the laboratory that conducted the analysis as a batch that is declared pesticide free down to 0,5 mg/kg hardly compares to a batch that is free of pesticides down to 0,1mg/kg. Additionally, reports from laboratoies that only test for varroacides are used to declare a beeswax batch to be free of residues, which is simply not the case. If it was, almost all African beeswax could be declared as residue free because the beekeepers there typically do not treat their bees against the Varroa mite.
Even organic beeswax does not necessarily imply that is does not contain residues because EU legislation does not require any documentation about residues.
In summary, it can be said that all of these terms carry little meaning as long as they are not documented by relevant analysis reports that clearly state what was analyzed and at which limits.
Unfortunately, many beeswax dealers avoid providing this information or simply don’t care or don’t know it any better. But we do not wish to talk about shortcoming of other offers and instead tell you exactly what standard we offer and how we define them. Before, we want to adress another issue in connection with residues however that is hardly discussed but from our perspective of high importance.

Differences between pesticide types found in beeswax

The first differentation that needs to be considered is that between herbicides, insecticides and fungicides. In beekeeping, it is only natural to assume that residues from insecticides that are specifically target insects have more negative influence on a beehive then herbicides or fungicides. While this cannot be generalized, it highlights the fact that not all pesticides display the same level of toxicity against bees, a fact that is widely ignored or at least not discussed. After all, what beekeeper would know that Chlorpyriphos has a nine times higher toxicity level then DDT for example or that Flumethrin is roughly 67 times more toxic to bees than tau-Fluvalinate. The analysis reports of most laboratories are however not targeted at beekeepers but at the industry, which is why there is no real differentation between toxicity levels. The only laboratoy that has taken this into account to our knowledge at this time (12.2.2024) is Ceralyze by adjusting the LOQ of the pesticides that they analyze according to the effect on bees.

An intersting tool in this context called Bee Tox Wax has been developed by the University of Liège in Belgium. It is a beeswax toxicity calculation tool that allows the user to insert known residue levels from a laboratory analysis report and provides an evaluation of the toxicity of the residue levels to bees. While the scientific basis of the calculations is not provided and the requirements seem fairly unrealistic from an economic pestictive with insight into actual residue limits worldwide, it is at the least a first attempt to establish a better quality standard for beeswax that is used in beekeeping.

Our standard, their definition and quality promise

So what do we do differently then?
Most importantly, we provide batch specific analysis with all beeswax that we sell, especially if it is for use in beekeeping. Our analysis reports do not simply list genereal wax criteria but that which is of relevance for beekeeping: adulteration and residues. Currently, we use the following laboratoris for our beekeeping wax:

Adulteration: Total hydrocarbons and GC by Ceralyse or NMR by Intertek

Residues: Multi Pesticide screening by Ceralyse

We believe that this combination of analysis provides the most appropriate and meaningful quality overview of beeswax that is intended to be used in beekeeping. On request, we can also provide pesticide analysis by other laboratories with lower LOQs and/or a Bee Tox Wax certificate, just let us now.
To differentiate between different quality types of beekeeping beeswax, we use the terms regular, low on pesticides, and pesticide free:

Feel free to contact us if you should have any further questions on analysis or residue levels and adulteration of beeswax. If you are looking for our beekeeping beeswax, please follow this link to our shop.