r/MasonBees

I have a bee garden on the front part of my house, west side of the house. I definitely thought that this area got full sun, but now I'm concerned that it might be getting some dappled sun with our sidewalk trees. These photos were taken at 1:30pm in Vancouver WA. Everything is flowering and has growth on it.

Some of the plants are growing pretty intensely towards the sun and my lavender is a bit droopy.
Thoughts? We can cut some limbs off the trees if

This is an update on the improved cage that I posted about earlier to protect from a pileated woodpecker. It appears to work well. It's funny how it investigates each side to find a way in. I'm glad that I used a thicker gauge wire and screwed it to the house because it's alarming how much the house gets jostled when the bird flies away.

Sorry about the bad focus (camera limitation) and it didn't capture the bird landing because there's a short delay between motion detection and recording.

I was chilling in the yard when a Pileated Woodpecker landed on a tree in front of me. Beautiful bird, but before I could get a photo, it flew to the bee house and grabbed onto the front.

I was wondering why a few of the nesting spots had been reopened in the evenings. Last year I lost most of the bees in the front of the house, likely to this or our resident Flickers (another woodpecker). That’s why I put up the mesh, but it was only about 1.5 inches from the nesting block, and the woodpecker’s beak is up to 2.4 inches.

The second photo is my hastily engineered solution, using some leftover cage fencing. It’s over 3 inches from the block. Hopefully this does the trick.

Last year march I bought a small insect hotel and put it in a corner on our balcony with the intention of hanging it asap and before I knew it, we already had masonbees. We live in the first floor so I didn't even know if it would work

I ended up hanging it as close as possible as where it was standing, it has almost no sun. But is fully protected from rain and wind.

Last year 1/5 of the hotel was full this year their are 14 'open' spaces of which at least 5 are also in use.

We live close to the alps on the Nord side.

The tubes are karton. And stuck in there. I want them to survive coming winter to and have enough space next year. What do I do?

We feel good about the name. "Trap"-ich. Trying on the Houdini Fly Traps!

I bought this one but it didn’t hold up to the weather after a year (wood warped etc). I was wondering if there are alternatives. It DID work by the way, was cool to see the bees grow. Just very expensive for only lasting a year.

Anybody else seeing them using the half size holes at the bottom? I’ve seen them barely squeeze in. This didn’t happen in previous years, but this year there are far more bees than housing.

I have been experimenting with the Malbec Houdini Fly trap since it came up on this subreddit:

Originally I had the trap fixed with a hook and wire to wall of my house; beside, behind, and under the Mason Bee hotel. I didn’t have great results in the couple weeks I had it mounted in that fashion.

Yesterday, I fixed the trap onto the house itself, per the tip from u/crownbees. Although the distance hadn’t much changed, the trap being physically attached seemed to be the secret sauce. The trap started catching the flies rather quickly after the change, and has continued to produce good results.

I’ve included the bottle of Argentinian Malbec I’ve used for reference. It was the cheapest bottle, on sale, at my local store.

Yesterday I opened some refrigerated paper insert straws from last year’s mason bees. one tube was stuffed with grass, rather than mud. it had two long, golden cocoons, and some dead larva / adult green insects. Anybody else seen this and can you identify them?

First timer here in sw Ontario Canada. I bought a mason bee house kit and mounted the house on my fence which gets eastern morning sun. The rest of the day it will get indirect light. House is near neighbors garden and blooming fruit trees. Looking at my weekly weather forecast is it too early to put my cocoons out?

For years now, the mason bees elected to nest in various crannies adjacent to their well-maintained and well-supplied mason bee house with clean reeds. This year the bees decided to nest in a toy. Behold, the now inoperable SuperSoaker.

Do you have bees making unusual choices in where they nest?

weirdest thing i done seen all day

I’m new to mason bees and this morning some of them hatched! When I was outside by their house, one of the landed on my hand and pooped on it? They’re so cute but what is this that they put on my had? First photo is undisturbed and second photo I swabbed it to see better.