Hello!
In our last event we had created a small booklet for each of our participants. The booklet was a compilation of all the information we had found while researching mason bees. Inside the book gives a quick rundown on each stage of the mason bee and what to do or what to expect. If you didn't make it out to our last event and can't make it out to our next one, we want to make sure you can get a little bee-education too!
If you CLICK HERE you can find our pdf version of the booklet.
Have a bee-utiful day!
Thursday 1 November 2012
Tuesday 30 October 2012
Shhh Please Don't Wake the Bees
Fall is in full swing in the city. The leaves are falling, along with the usual precipitation, and the temperature is starting its steady decline. No condition for a mason bee, so what are they up to?
Much like many species, fall and winter are the seasons of hibernation for the mason bees.
Back around March and early April the female mason bees (that emerged in February) laid her eggs. Mason bees don't waste any time, reproduction starts once the female bees emerge from the nesting hole. The early stages of a mason bee is much like a butterfly, it also goes through a process of metamorphosis from egg, larvae, pupa (cocoon), to bee.
The larvae break free from their egg around late April to May, they gather up their strength by eating the pollen/nectar mixture that was left for them back when they were laid by their mom. Good ol' mom!
The cocoon spinning process begins around June and July, and throughout August to September the metamorphosis from larvae to bee slowly begins.
So that brings us to October, the bees are now fully formed and hibernating. After all the physical changes to their bodies over the past 4-5 months you can see how they need some serious rest. The bees won't leave their dormant state until the spring when the weather warms up to 12 to 15 degrees Celsius.
Check out Crown Bees website for some awesome photos of mason bees throughout the metamorphosis process.
Hope to see you at our final workshop this Saturday! We will be building and painting mason bee houses at Kiwassa Neighbourhood House.
See further info in the right side bar.
Much like many species, fall and winter are the seasons of hibernation for the mason bees.
Back around March and early April the female mason bees (that emerged in February) laid her eggs. Mason bees don't waste any time, reproduction starts once the female bees emerge from the nesting hole. The early stages of a mason bee is much like a butterfly, it also goes through a process of metamorphosis from egg, larvae, pupa (cocoon), to bee.
The larvae break free from their egg around late April to May, they gather up their strength by eating the pollen/nectar mixture that was left for them back when they were laid by their mom. Good ol' mom!
The cocoon spinning process begins around June and July, and throughout August to September the metamorphosis from larvae to bee slowly begins.
So that brings us to October, the bees are now fully formed and hibernating. After all the physical changes to their bodies over the past 4-5 months you can see how they need some serious rest. The bees won't leave their dormant state until the spring when the weather warms up to 12 to 15 degrees Celsius.
Check out Crown Bees website for some awesome photos of mason bees throughout the metamorphosis process.
Hope to see you at our final workshop this Saturday! We will be building and painting mason bee houses at Kiwassa Neighbourhood House.
See further info in the right side bar.
Tuesday 4 September 2012
Sweet Little Event House Revealed
The workshop is almost here!
Have you registered yet? It's not too late, follow the registration link in the side bar and complete the short (1 minute, seriously) survey.
Just to be clear, as we have been asked by many, there will be no live bees at this event. Our mason bee friends are now hibernating until the spring, so there won't be any joining us.
Finally the moment you've been waiting for! Here is the sweet little house you can make if you sign up for the workshop at Kiwassa this Saturday.
There will be paint to jazz up your house for the bees.
So don't forget, this Saturday, Kiwassa, 12pm.
Beeeee there for the bees!
Monday 27 August 2012
Mason Bees Vs. Honey Bees
When you’re the typical bee that most people recognise, a honey bee, a night on the town can be very expensive. A typical colony can contain anywhere of up to 60,000 bees so you can imagine the bar tab. Mason bees are a bit more shy and enjoy bee-ing by themselves, making for more manageable drink bills.
If mason bees live alone, why would they want to nest in the bee boxes? Well, Dr. Margriet Dogterom’s book Pollination With Mason Bees, uses a very easy to understand analogy. She says to think of them like renters. Now most of us have rented in some point in our lives, or know someone who rents. A typical apartment building can house lots of people, and these renters may never interact. Mason bees are very much like this. Just because they live in the same building doesn’t mean they live together.
If you’ve just moved into an apartment building or are visiting a friend, it can sometimes be hard to find the right door. Mason bees have some trouble with this too! A mason bee house like the one in Tanya’s past post or like the ones we will be building ideally should be marked with colours at the entrance so bees can easily find their’s. It is suggested that grouped together houses have a simple design across the whole face of the box. For example a big blue X or a V can be helpful. It is even helpful to paint each tunnel with colour. The key is simplicity. One or two colours per house.
Just like our homes, each ‘apartment’ of a mason bee house is home to several bees from the same mother. This is where the depth of the tunnels comes into play. Mason bees lay their eggs in a particular way: females at the back and males near the front. A shorter tunnel means that there will be less female eggs laid, resulting in an abundance of males from that family.
Once the bees lay their eggs, they seal up the opening of the tunnel with a mud mixture. The baby mason bees then begin the process of developing into fully-grown bees for next spring.
It is over this time of development that we will be helping the bees along. We'll detail this in future blog posts as well as in a printable booklet to keep handy!
References
Dogterom, D. (2009). Pollination with mason bees: A gardener’s guide to managing mason bees for fruit production. Coquitlam, BC: Beediverse publishing of CPC Ltd.
If mason bees live alone, why would they want to nest in the bee boxes? Well, Dr. Margriet Dogterom’s book Pollination With Mason Bees, uses a very easy to understand analogy. She says to think of them like renters. Now most of us have rented in some point in our lives, or know someone who rents. A typical apartment building can house lots of people, and these renters may never interact. Mason bees are very much like this. Just because they live in the same building doesn’t mean they live together.
 |
| A Blue Orchard Mason Bee Source - http://www.agf.gov.bc.ca |
If you’ve just moved into an apartment building or are visiting a friend, it can sometimes be hard to find the right door. Mason bees have some trouble with this too! A mason bee house like the one in Tanya’s past post or like the ones we will be building ideally should be marked with colours at the entrance so bees can easily find their’s. It is suggested that grouped together houses have a simple design across the whole face of the box. For example a big blue X or a V can be helpful. It is even helpful to paint each tunnel with colour. The key is simplicity. One or two colours per house.
Just like our homes, each ‘apartment’ of a mason bee house is home to several bees from the same mother. This is where the depth of the tunnels comes into play. Mason bees lay their eggs in a particular way: females at the back and males near the front. A shorter tunnel means that there will be less female eggs laid, resulting in an abundance of males from that family.
Once the bees lay their eggs, they seal up the opening of the tunnel with a mud mixture. The baby mason bees then begin the process of developing into fully-grown bees for next spring.
It is over this time of development that we will be helping the bees along. We'll detail this in future blog posts as well as in a printable booklet to keep handy!
References
Dogterom, D. (2009). Pollination with mason bees: A gardener’s guide to managing mason bees for fruit production. Coquitlam, BC: Beediverse publishing of CPC Ltd.
Wednesday 22 August 2012
Building a Mason Bee Haus
Finding your own space is hard
when you’re a city bee. And it’s not the cost of living in Vancouver that’s the problem.
By building mason bee homes for
bees we create a safe space that brings the bees closer to a food source
(because commuting long distances is tiring for insects too), and it helps
decrease the potential threat of pests (less break-ins).
This is a standard mason bee
house.
The house design is meant to
mimic what bees look for in nature. The roof of course is shelter from the
rain, but more detailed things are key for bees, like a good landing pad. By
making the length of the frame bigger than the trays (you see them stacked in
the house) you give the bees a place to land where they
can take a breather before climbing into their holes.
Each tray has a row of channels
that from the outside look like rows of holes when the trays are stacked. The
channels are generally 5-6 inches deep; this gives the mason bees space to lay
their eggs. Every website we came across about mason bee house design said to
make the diameter of the holes 5/16 of an inch… I’m not sure how they figured
this number out (picturing mason bees with little tape measures going from tree
to tree).
Here is a video for a mason bee
retailer that makes pretty spiffy houses. She gives a great visual breakdown on what a
good mason bee house looks like.
Stay tuned for pictures of the
mason bee house design chosen for the event!
Friday 17 August 2012
For the Love of Bees
Hello!
Vancouver gardens were looking spectacular
once again this year! And we can credit in part those “green thumbed” folks,
but we can’t forget the bees. Not just the fuzzy little bumblebee, or the sweet
little honeybee, we also have to credit the native pollinator, the mason bee.
Mason bee homes seem to be growing in numbers
around the city, in parks and community gardens, but for those interested in
getting into mason bee care, those little wooden boxes can pretty expensive to
buy or seem a little hard to make.
Well lucky you for finding us. You can build your own mason bee home for free!
Bee
the Future is a community workshop funded by a
Vancouver Greenest City Grant.
Saturday, September 8th from 12-2:30pm at Kiwassa
Neighbourhood House.
Look for the registration link in the
sidebar! (Space is limited)
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