🫙 Propolis Extraction Lab

About this simulation

Raw propolis — the resinous mixture bees make from tree sap, wax and their own secretions — is not water-soluble as a whole. Producers scrape it from hive frames, chill and grind it, then macerate the fragments in a solvent that pulls the resins and flavonoids into solution while leaving most of the wax and inert debris behind as sediment. What comes out the other end is tincture: a liquid extract whose strength depends entirely on the solvent, the time given, and the temperature.

How it works

• Solvent choice — high-proof ethanol dissolves resins fastest and most completely; diluted ethanol is gentler but slower; glycerin is solvent-free-friendly but weak; plain water barely touches the resin fraction at all.
• Extraction time & temperature — dissolution follows a diminishing-returns curve: quick gains early, then a long tail as the last resin works free of the wax matrix. Warmth speeds diffusion.
• Agitation — daily shaking keeps fresh solvent in contact with each fragment's surface, meaningfully shortening the time needed to reach a given yield.
• Wax sediment — propolis wax is largely insoluble in these solvents and settles to the jar floor as flakes, which is why finished tincture is filtered before bottling.

Controls

• Solvent — pick the maceration liquid.
• Extraction time — days the batch has been macerating (1–30).
• Maceration temp — ambient/warm-bath temperature in °C.
• Daily agitation — toggle whether the batch is shaken each day.
• ↺ New batch — resets the jar with fresh scrapings. Drag to rotate, scroll to zoom.

Did you know?

Commercial propolis tinctures are typically standardized around 65–75% ethanol and matured for two to four weeks with periodic shaking — long enough to plateau on yield without extracting excessive plant waxes and pigments that cloud the final product.