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This is one busy bee! All the pollen we see on honey bees goes to feed their larvae. It's the nectar they collect mixed with bees' unique enzymes that becomes the nutrient-rich honey that feeds them during the winter months. Unlike most insects, honey bees stay active all winter long,...
A good friend of mine recently made a trip home to Boise to visit her family and had the opportunity to learn about some local honey beekeeping efforts. She's been talking about getting a hive for her yard here in Seattle for some time, so was an eager student as...
How does soap clean? Soaps and detergents both do a good job of cleaning. They are “surface active” substances (surfactants), which means that they make water better at cleaning surfaces. The water is doing most of the work, and the soap/detergent is facilitating the process. They are a help...
How are handcrafted soaps different from commercial soaps? The chemical process used to make soap is dictated by nature, but the ingredients and process used by large scale commercial soapmakers is very different from handcrafted (small scale) soapmaking. The biggest difference is that most commercial soapmakers start out by...
What is soap? Soap is simply the product that comes from mixing a mild acid (fats and oils) and a base (sodium hydroxide, also called lye) together. When combined, those two ingredients produce a basic salt (soap) and glycerin. This is not the kind of salt that you sprinkle on...
