Spring Has Sprung

Welcome back everyone! Like the bees we were hibernating through winter but are ready to spring into mason bee action again. Though it's not officially spring (not until March 20th) some bees have already hatched and are pollinating the crocuses and other early bloomers around town.

I haven't yet seen any mason bees, but I've been keeping my eye out for them. Have you seen any around your garden yet?

 

Can you spot the bee?

In the next blog post this week I'll explain how to put up your mason bee house and give you tips on location. I'll also be posting pictures of my mason bee cocoons that I recently put outside to hatch and release.

It's nice to bee back :)

 

Back to class: Mason Bee 101

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!

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.

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!

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.

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.