Muslin Kitchen Towels

Count the packages to get as many towels as possible. (charlotte ekker wiggins photo)

Muslin Kitchen Towels

Here’s a beekeeping item you won’t find on most beekeeping equipment lists, muslin kitchen towels. And yet today I can’t imagine beekeeping, or gardening for that matter, without them.

Muslin kitchen towels are what I use most of the beekeeping season to keep my bees calm during inspections instead of smoke. Assuming I’ve chosen the right time of day and favorable weather conditions, I can drape open hive bodies with muslin kitchen towels as I inspect.

Not using smoke makes it easier to locate a queen and reduces the amount of smoke flavor that can end up in honey.

Muslin kitchen towels are also handy for storing propolis - who remembers to have a container for saving those hive extras.

The towels can also be draped around beekeeper’s necks and heads to stay cool. I tend to wrap one around my neck now as part of my beekeeper’s uniform.

And for gardening? Keeping a muslin kitchen towel in my gardening buckets comes in handy for moving those plants I didn’t plan to move!

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Charlotte