The Walden Effect: Farming, simple living, permaculture, and invention.

Galleria mellonella

   bee pollen and smoke

We found our first wax moth cocoon today in one of the hives.

That means the larvae has been burrowing into the beeswax comb looking for impurities, which they live on. They don't eat any wax, but their little caves can cause honey to spill out, making more work for the colony to repair.

I wonder if a small wax moth population might have benefits for the colony by having impurities removed?



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About us: Anna Hess and Mark Hamilton spent over a decade living self-sufficiently in the mountains of Virginia before moving north to start over from scratch in the foothills of Ohio. They've experimented with permaculture, no-till gardening, trailersteading, home-based microbusinesses and much more, writing about their adventures in both blogs and books.



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