More Than Saskatchewan Honey: Bee Pollen, Beeswax, Propolis, and Royal Jelly Explained
Honey gets all the attention, but it’s only one piece of the magic happening inside a beehive. While we see a wooden box full of buzzing bees, the colony is out there turning flowers, tree sap, and a bit of bee spit into some incredibly useful products. From pollen to propolis, here’s what the bees are making behind the scenes.
BEE POLLEN
Bee pollen is the hive’s main protein source. By weight, it's 35% protein, higher than red meat. It’s packed with vitamins, minerals, and antioxidants, which is why humans use it too. It tastes like mildly sweet, slightly nutty, floral granules that start crunchy and soften as you chew. Great in smoothies, yogurt and granola bowls, or salads. It’s also an ingredient in Kitako Lake’s Black Gold.
When a bee lands on a flower, negatively charged pollen sticks to her positively charged body hairs. She combs it off, mixes it with nectar and saliva, and packs it into the pollen baskets on her hind legs to bring back to the hive. Back at the hive, bees ferment this mixture in the honeycomb cells by mixing it with honey and more saliva, creating “bee bread”—the hive’s long-lasting, highly digestible protein source. So they get pollen from flowers, and if you find that interesting, you might want to read more about How Saskatchewan Bees Find the Best Flowers.
ROYAL JELLY
This special nutrient-rich secretion is made by the bees to feed their queen and larvae. Some human folks take it in supplements or health tonics for nutrition and energy or mix it into skincare. It’s also used by humans for “immune support”, although scientific evidence is mixed on that one. It’s precious in the hive, so ethical harvesting matters and not all producers do it responsibly. If you’re buying it, make sure it’s from a beekeeper who’s not harming their colonies to get it.
PROPOLIS
Propolis is a sticky, resinous substance bees use to seal cracks, protect the hive, and keep microbes at bay. It’s made from tree resins mixed with beeswax, nectar, and bee enzymes. Forager bees collect resin from trees like poplar and evergreens, using the baskets on their legs to bring it back to the hive. It’s so sticky that other bees have to help remove it from the forager’s legs. Inside the hive, they knead it with wax and enzymes to create propolis.
Humans use it because of its antiviral, antibacterial, antifungal, and antimicrobial properties. It supports immune health, promotes wound healing, and is used in tinctures, salves, and throat sprays. Many Indigenous cultures have used it for generations and modern science is finally catching up to the value of propolis for humans.
BEESWAX
Beeswax is a natural wax produced by bees to build honeycomb, a structure made entirely of perfect hexagon-shaped wax cells and used to store honey, pollen, and brood. Each worker bee can secrete tiny flakes of wax from glands on her abdomen, then chew and shape them into comb. It’s like a nursery, storage unit, and pantry all in one. We humans love it because we can make all sorts of useful non-toxic things with it, including candles, it’s protective and moisturizing so great for lip balms and other skin care, and natural food wraps.
DISCOVER ALL THE PRODUCTS SASKATCHEWAN BEEHIVES MAKE
The production of all of these is extremely time consuming, energy intensive, and very necessary for the health and maintenance of the hive. But it’s not just the hive that benefits: our entire ecology benefits from pollinators being healthy and doing their thing. We benefit, animals benefit, and plants benefit. These products are byproducts of this incredible service of pollination that bees perform.