“Bee Houses” provide cover and places to raise young for bees. They’re easy and fun to make, or can be purchased commercially from several vendors.
The orchard mason bee is a wonderful little creature. It does not live in a nest like other bees; it lives in wooden blocks, but does not drill holes and destroy wooden items like other bees. It uses holes that are already available. The male orchard mason bee can not sting and the female rarely stings.
Bee House Instructions
• With drill bits of various sizes (5/16th of an inch works best for Mason bees) simply take some scrap lumber and drill holes 3 to 5 inches deep but not all the way through the wood block. For example, get a 4 inch by 4 inch piece of wood and drill holes that are 3 and 1/2 inches deep.
• You can cover the holes with chicken wire to help keep birds away from the bee house.
• Securely place the bee house on the south side of buildings, fence posts, or trees.
• Scatter some of the houses throughout your community. You may find an excellent location to trap some bees and then move them to your location.
• DO NOT move bee houses after they are in place until at least November.
• DO NOT spray insecticides on or around bee houses.
• If you choose to build your own bee houses, DO NOT use treated wood.
Be sure to be cautious of the use of insecticides around bees and especially during open bloom. Use products that are recommended, and during times that the bees will not suffer.
Providing cover for bees is a great way to qualify your yard as a National Wildlife Federation Certified Wildlife Habitat site.
Seventy percent of the vegetation in Kansas is pollinated by insects. That includes 90 different crops requiring honeybee pollination. When pollination is interrupted, plants not only can’t replicate themselves, they aren’t available for food and cover in the environment, said Chip Taylor, the director of Monarch Watch, an organization that promotes conservation and education about the importance of the Monarch butterfly. He spoke with the Great Bend Tribune Monday, July 21, by telephone.
Insects and animals that ensure plants reproduce by transferring pollen from bloom to bloom are pollinators. Butterflies, while not big pollinators, are an indicator species because they share habitat with other insect pollinators, as well as essential nesting birds and small animals that help with the pollination process. Butterfly and bee populations have drastically been reduced in less than a decade which has now caught the attention of people outside the circles of entomologists and beekeepers. And local home gardeners have noticed with fewer fruits and vegetables in the garden, despite favorable weather.
Bees and more bees
According to Taylor, as more shelter belts are turned to cropland, and herbicide-ready crops are doused with glyphosphate, the active ingredient in Roundup, killing among several weeds the beneficial milkweed, food supplies and habitat continues to shrink.
“We’re probably one bad winter away from a serious honeybee shortage,” Taylor said. “If something happens to them, we’ll all feel it in the supermarket.”
Other beneficials like bumblebees have been hit harder still. According to Greg Swob of Swobee Honey farm in Albert, bumblebees are not as social as honeybees. There may be a handful, perhaps dozens or potentially, hundreds of bumblebees in any one colony. That’s small compared to the 40,000 to 60,000 honeybees in the typical colony. Their numbers allow them to breed away from a small problem more easily than bumblebees, he said.
“Bumblebees are an amazing pollinator – they are large and strong enough to literally shake the living daylights out of a tomato flower to help pollinate it,” Swob said. “A honeybee isn’t large or strong enough to do this.”
Stem the tide
Home gardeners have a chance to help stem the tide, he said. Two things he recommended include limiting the use of pesticides and choosing beneficial plants for the garden.
Neonicotinoid insecticides were introduced about 20 years ago, and are popular because they are effective--perhaps a little too effective, Taylor said. These are systemic insecticides, which means they are taken up into a plant and are present in all the different parts of the plant. They last a long time, too, compared to surface insecticides. They work on the nervous system of insects, causing them to die from excitement. Because of the number of receptors in their brains for these chemicals, insects are selectively affected by the pesticides.
Taylor admits some controls are needed now and then. “We need to learn to enjoy nature in all its forms, and if some control is needed, it should be the least toxic available, with the least history and residue effect,” he said. Always be sure to read labels and make sure the chemical of choice is approved to treat the particular plant. Spraying or dusting some vegetables and fruits when blooms are present may be counterproductive, for instance.
Native nectar
Many native plants are good nectar sources for pollinators, and because they are native, they are better able to fend off disease and pests. Keep this in mind when choosing garden plants. Some good choices are echinaceas, otherwise known as purple coneflowers, most flowers in the sunflower family, and mints, Taylor said. Mints are very attractive to honeybees. In fact, the gardens at Kansas University, where Taylor teaches, include over 10 varieties of mints. Where possible, forgo showier plants in favor of those that produce nectar and pollen, he said. This is something the nursery industry has bred out of many of the flashier bedding plants in favor of larger and more prolific blooms.
“Notice the next time you’re at one of these garden centers that there are few pollinators present,” Taylor said. “There is a reason for that.”
That doesn’t mean your garden has to look drab. Take a drive out to the Kansas Wetlands Education Center and check out the butterfly garden near the entrance to beneficials in bloom. Some are easier to find than others, but let supply and demand work in your favor. If the local garden center doesn’t carry the desired plants, Taylor suggests gardeners begin requesting the plants, and in no time they will become available.
