Beeswax is a key ingredient in bodycare making. It's used to make unblendable oil and water bind together into a smooth emulsion to create lotions and creams.

Happily, Euphorbia antisyphillitica and Pedilanthus pavonis, shrubs native to northern Mexico and the southwestern United States, provide a vegan alternative to beeswax. They produce a scale-like covering on their leaves and stems which is boiled to yield a hard vegetable wax called candelilla wax.

Candelilla melts, mixes and blends very similarly to beeswax. Vegetable-based emulsifying wax (or e-wax) can also be used, but because it's heavily manufactured and retains a residue of polysorbates, I avoid it.

Candelilla wax isn't too hard to find, though it's not as available as beeswax. You may have to mail order it. Mountain Rose Herbs on the west coast has it, and From Nature With Love on the east coast. If you know of other good places to find it, please post them here!