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Install things resembling 'bee hotels' everywhere you can. Very low cost, potentially might be of great benefit. I was very surprised to see a few solitary bees

Install things resembling 'bee hotels' everywhere you can. Very low cost, potentially might be of great benefit. I was very surprised to see a few solitary bees using the ones that we put in our garden. Then plant a patch of bee-friendly plants, like wildflowers and clover. Also, you don't need to take the honey from a beehive. I don't, I just keep them because I like honeybees. Doesn't reduce all of your upkeep concerns, but does decouple it from needing to achieve an outcome, which can take reduce some mental stress.

cmrdporcupine 5y ago
For sure, right now outside it's bee heaven because I have a lot of cucurbits in flower all over the gardens (uh, anybody want cucumbers and pumpkins? Crap.) And there's a lot of comfrey which has gone crazy all over my farm and the bees seem to really be into that as it pretty consistently flowers over the whole summer. Around this time of year I put buckwheat in as a cover crop, that way it flowers right before frost and then dies back before I plant garlic. When there's a field of buckwheat in flower it's absolutely mental how busy the insects are.
whichquestion 5y ago
The bee hotels we have typically attract non-native mason bees which are later parasitized by parasitoid wasps. It may be better to encourage plants that have pithy stems and leave them over winter (if you are in area with winter) so that bees can use them to nest. Planting wildflowers with genetics native to your region is among the best things you can do to support pollinators.
- quercusa 5y ago
  We had one of those bee hotels up. It turned out to be a buffet for the parasitoid wasps. There seems to a reason that mason bees, etc. are called 'solitary'. We've currently got Mountain Mint (Pycnanthemum muticum) and Joe Pye weed (Eutrochium dubium 'Little Joe') blooming. They are covered in honeybees and all kinds of others I've never seen before.
lostlogin 5y ago
> Also, you don't need to take the honey from a beehive. How do you manage this? Done they run out of space and swarm? I have one that I took 7 boxes from (somewhere around 100kgs of honey) and I also split it during the season to stop them swarming - they grew so fast. If I hadn’t there would have been swarms every few weeks.

cmrdporcupine 5y ago

For sure, right now outside it's bee heaven because I have a lot of cucurbits in flower all over the gardens (uh, anybody want cucumbers and pumpkins? Crap.) And there's a lot of comfrey which has gone crazy all over my farm and the bees seem to really be into that as it pretty consistently flowers over the whole summer. Around this time of year I put buckwheat in as a cover crop, that way it flowers right before frost and then dies back before I plant garlic. When there's a field of buckwheat in flower it's absolutely mental how busy the insects are.

whichquestion 5y ago

The bee hotels we have typically attract non-native mason bees which are later parasitized by parasitoid wasps. It may be better to encourage plants that have pithy stems and leave them over winter (if you are in area with winter) so that bees can use them to nest. Planting wildflowers with genetics native to your region is among the best things you can do to support pollinators.

quercusa 5y ago
We had one of those bee hotels up. It turned out to be a buffet for the parasitoid wasps. There seems to a reason that mason bees, etc. are called 'solitary'. We've currently got Mountain Mint (Pycnanthemum muticum) and Joe Pye weed (Eutrochium dubium 'Little Joe') blooming. They are covered in honeybees and all kinds of others I've never seen before.

lostlogin 5y ago

> Also, you don't need to take the honey from a beehive. How do you manage this? Done they run out of space and swarm? I have one that I took 7 boxes from (somewhere around 100kgs of honey) and I also split it during the season to stop them swarming - they grew so fast. If I hadn’t there would have been swarms every few weeks.