“Solutions to the problems of beekeeping and bee health may come most rapidly if we are as attuned to the biologist Charles Darwin as we are to the Reverend Lorenzo L. Langstroth.” - Tom Seeley, American Bee Journal “Human ingenuity may make various inventions, but it will never devise any invention more beautiful, nor more simple, nor more to the purpose than Nature does, because in her inventions nothing is wanting and nothing is superfluous” - Leonardo da Vinci, fifteenth century "Ask now the beasts, and they shall teach thee." - Job 12:7

So we’ve pondered some human-centric nonsense in Just Say No To the Plastic Pall. Let’s move on to the main event of what a better beehive looks like to bees. Remember, biology > human convenience/market dictates/human infatuation with shiny new things.

The natural home of the honey bee is a tree hollow. When bees find a suitable hollow they perform the laborious work of removing debris and chewing down the decomposing surface of the cavity. When they reach firmer, living wood they begin foraging for plant tree resins. Trees evolved to secrete antimicrobial resins to protect wounds and new growth from infection. The resins are antibacterial, antifungal, even antiviral.

When tree resins are collected by the honey bee and deposited in a hive we call them propolis. Resin is a botanical term. Propolis is a bee term. Propolis is wonderful for honey bees. This has been demonstrated in awesome^[1] f’n^[2] science.^[3] Wellness companies claim propolis remedies all manner of human ailments. I don't know if this is true. There is not enough evidence for me to claim a remedy to illness. Those claims are based on results from petri dishes. You are not a petri dish. You are much more rollickingly grand.

Wild and alluring claims that are beyond current science are clearly profitable. Who wouldn’t want vigorous wellness in a jar? Alas, wellness companies breezily proceed beyond evidence for your dollar. Wellness companies do this for their well-paid wellbeing, not your wellness. But forgive them. Before deceiving us they have taken great pains to deceive themselves.

Back to bees.

Honey bees forage for tree resins, affix them to their back legs, fly home and deposit them to fill cracks, crevices and line walls with what researchers call a “propolis envelope.” At DHB, we call it a propolis hug. 🤗

The preparation of a tree cavity is an example of social immunity–the cooperative behavioral defenses among members of a social group that result in the avoidance, management, or elimination of disease. A social immune system takes stress off the immune system of individual bees. Without a propolis hug, the stress of an elevated immune response in each bee leads to decreased survival and a shorter, less productive lifespan.

Healthy social immunity is akin to a human living and growing in a healthy, safe, nurturing community.

Honey bees with a propolis hug have a more diverse, stable and less pathogenic microbial environment. They have more proteins in their blood that indicate better nourishment. And because bees with a propolis hug have less immune system activation, they have stronger immune responses when challenged with a pathogen. Unlike human treatments for disease, bees collect propolis from an ever rotating mix of tree species. This rotation makes evolution of resistance among pathogens difficult.

Propolis even leads to upregulation of detoxification genes that produce enzymes capable of breaking down pesticides and fungicides into less harmful byproducts.

Adding to that, propolis is waterproof. It slows the decay of wood and helps promote a stable hive temperature and humidity via condensation. In winter when it is too cold to fly, bees can collect water from in-hive condensation.

But we’re not done! In a laboratory setting propolis extracts as low as 0.5% caused narcotic effects leading to reduced metabolism and lower body heat of the dreaded Varroa destructor. These sublethal effects may prevent destructor from reproducing. You don’t have to kill a single mite to lower mite populations. You only have to lower mite reproduction.

Beekeepers generally don’t like propolis. In heat it is tacky. In the cold it is brittle. It gums up hive parts and stains clothing. Beekeepers have actively selected against the trait of resin collection for our convenience. But natural selection has already meditated on the matter of what propolis is to the honey bee. If beekeepers dismiss this, it says much about the beekeeper and little about natural selection. In my observation, bees gum up the moveable parts of a hive less when they have a surface that encourages propolis deposition. Give the honey bee what her nature seeks!

It is easy to modify standard beekeeping equipment to trigger this healthy bee behavior. Drew’s Honeybees has been doing it for years. You roughen smooth lumber. Woodworkers call this rasping. Drew’s Honeybees calls this chainsaw massacring*. Smooth lumber is evolutionarily foreign to creatures that evolved residing in tree cavities. Splintery, grooved lumber is a challenge that bees recognize and will gamely meet.

*Wood dust is a serious carcinogen.^[6] Wear a good mask.

Modification is easy. All you need is a chainsaw, a workers’ pluck, a love of biology, curiosity, a lil’ humility, and some Waylon Jennings.* I remove as little wood as possible to make the box a splintery mess.^[7] Yup, the goal is a splintery mess. All the crevices, grooves and roughness resemble a… anyone? A tree hollow! A splintery box, like a tree hollow, would be a microbial problem. With the humidity from the bees’ respiration all manner of microbes would grow and rot the box. But the bees have a formidable solution for this microbial challenge. And they’ll be healthier for meeting your and the microbes challenge.

* Or Cardi B. Or anyone else.

A beekeeper once looked at me and shook his head. I’d chainsawed hundreds of boxes and a pile of sawdust lay at my feet. “That’s a lot of wasted wood.” I hemmed and hawed. It wasn’t a lot of wasted wood considering the number of boxes. But to the point, what is a tree hollow–a fine home for a beehive, the home from which the honey bee conquered much of the globe–but wasted wood?

Beekeepers, let’s up our game. Remember–biology first.

[1] Simone-Finstrom, M., Borba, R. S., Wilson, M., & Spivak, M. (2017). Propolis counteracts some threats to honey bee health. Insects, 8(2), 46. https://doi.org/10.3390/insects8020046

[2] Shanahan, M., Simone-Finstrom, M., Tokarz, P., Rinkevich, F., Read, Q. D., & Spivak, M. (2024). Thinking inside the box: Restoring the propolis envelope facilitates honey bee social immunity. PLOS ONE, 19(1), e0291744. https://doi.org/10.1371/journal.pone.0291744

[3] Simone-Finstrom, M., & Spivak, M. (2010). Propolis and bee health: The natural history and significance of resin use by honey bees. Apidologie, 41(3), 295–311. https://doi.org/10.1051/apido/2010016

[4] Mao, W., Schuler, M. A., & Berenbaum, M. R. (2013). Honey constituents up-regulate detoxification and immunity genes in the western honey bee Apis mellifera. Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences of the United States of America, 110(22), 8842–8846. https://doi.org/10.1073/pnas.1303884110MDPI+3

[5] Garedew, A., Lamprecht, I., Schmolz, E., & Schricker, B. (2002). The varroacidal action of propolis: A laboratory assay. Apidologie, 33(1), 41–50. https://doi.org/10.1051/apido:2001008

[6] OEHHA. (2023, September). Wood dust. California Office of Environmental Health Hazard Assessment. https://www.p65warnings.ca.gov/fact-sheets/wood-dust

[7] Drew’s Honeybees. [drewshoneybees] (2025, April 9). How to Make A Better Beehive–According to Science Without Spending a Dime! [video] YouTube. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=X2WepKS__6g&t=21s