The BYU Bee Team held a beeswax craft night making sustainable food wraps on Thursday, Oct. 16.
The event educated students on how beeswax is a long-lasting resource that can take the place of plastic wrap. The wraps are made from cotton fabric and beeswax.
Jack Winters, the bee master of the Apiology Association at BYU, said the beeswax has “antibacterial and antifungal properties” that allow it keep food fresh for longer.
“You can store cheese especially in beeswax wraps, and it doesn't go moldy for a super long time,” Winters said.
Bethany Edgel, the project manager of B-search and former Apiology Association President, said the wraps can have a good lifespan if they are rinsed after each use. Eventually, they can be composted. Another benefit is that there are no microplastics.
The Bee team has many different events held throughout the semester, and anyone is welcome to join.
“We want to find students that are interested in bees, whether it's the science of bees, beekeeping, making sustainable crafts with beeswax, just anything to do with bees, we'd love to have you,” Edgel said.
Grace Loveless, the Apiology Association president at BYU, said that last month they had a presentation given by Winters on bees. Winters is very knowledgable, so students were able to ask him all sorts of bee-related questions.
“We got a lot of people there, and it was really fun to learn more about bee reproduction, and how they [keep] the hives ... and different things like that,” Loveless said.
Loveless emphasized that the bees kept at BYU are “BYU’s bees.”
“Really the purpose of them is for anyone who's interested in bees, hive maintenance, sustainability of the environment — that sort of thing,” Loveless said.
Loveless continued that the Bee Team hopes to outreach to apiology associations in other universities to collaborate with them or to see if they would like help starting their own.