Mason Bees

Extras to mason bee houses such as these best mason beekeeping accessories help you provide best conditions for the solitary bees. Taking care of mason bees and meeting their needs requires you to go beyond just providing a suitable habitat. Use these accessories to get the best results in keeping mason bees. Mason bees that are taken good care of give you a thriving nest of pollinators. You get a large population of the bees every year and your plants are pollinated in the best way. The accessories are made using the best materials by reputable manufacturers. You are sure they work well and are safe for use with humans, insects and animals.

Keeping mason bees is important to many people because of its function in plant pollination. This ultimate guide to keeping mason bees takes you through various practices for best result. Some bits of it are also applicable in leafcutter beekeeping. Both mason and leafcutter bees are native and solitary. They do not form colonies but instead make nests in hollow cavities. Their lifecycle is very unique and dependent on the seasons of the year. Each year, the old generation of mason bees dies so that there is new generation the following year. In this guide, you will get useful information about many things including the lifecycle of mason bees, how they make nests, setting up a mason bee house and harvesting cocoons.

Solitary bees are better at plant pollination than honeybees. Here is an exploration of solitary beekeeping and tips for success with mason and leafcutter bees. Mason bees get their name from using mud to build their nests. Leafcutter bees use bits of leaves to build their nests. They are unlike honeybees that live in a colony, and use wax among other materials such as propolis to make their habitat. Honeybees also produce honey and other beehive products. Strong jaws and large lips on mason and leafcutter bees are suitable for collecting materials for building nests. This article looks at best practices to help you with keeping, with a focus on mason and leafcutter bees. Use these tips for success with mason and leafcutter bees and enjoy great pollination for your plants.

Raising mason bees for plant pollination is better than using honeybees. Mason bees are solitary bees and native to the American continent. This article arms you with useful information on how to raise mason bees. Among other aspects, it explores the mason bee house, providing for mason bees and management practices for best results in mason beekeeping. The article also delves into the lifecycle of mason bees so that you get deep understanding of mason beekeeping processes and management practices. Use the tips on how to raise mason bees for successful mason beekeeping operations with great pollination of your plants.

Being the better pollinator in comparison to honeybees has made mason beekeeping useful and popular. For best results with your mason beekeeping, here is a guide on how to wash and store mason bee cocoons. The guide covers the process of harvesting cocoons, cleaning them up, and storing them in the best way to ensure you get healthy mason bees from the cocoons. Poor harvesting, cleaning and storage techniques kill mason bees in their cocoons. It is important to wash mason bee cocoons for various reasons including disease and pest control. Equally important in storage in the right conditions so that mason bee cocoons remain viable. Handle mason bee cocoons with care when harvesting, washing and storing them. They contain living organisms in them that you do not want to hurt.

Starting a mason bee population with cocoons is easy. You buy the cocoons from sellers such as Crown Bees and install them in the mason bee house. In a small period of time, you will have a large number of mason bees in the nest. You can buy the mason bee house separately from other items you need such as nesting tubes and attractants. Mason beekeepers also have the option of getting everything in one package. It is best to go for the complete set which includes the mason bee house, nesting tubes, and attractant since it makes purchasing the requirements easy. You do it once, instead of making multiple purchases, sometimes from different suppliers. In this article, we will discuss the best mason bee kits that come packaged with bees.

Beekeeping is not only one of the most fulfilling hobbies, but it also a most rewarding venture for agriculturists. There are, however, some limiting factors, including honey bee predators, being one of the biggest challenges to beekeepers. Some of these include: beetles, rodents, wasps, ants, mammals, and birds. Poor hive management that leads to improper mitigation of these pests and predators certainly weakens the bee colony. While honey bees may instinctively keep off most of their enemies using their stinger, they sometimes require some assistance from the beekeeper. The tiny bee is a target of small to large predators making it an insurmountable task for a single colony to defend itself from all these predators and pests. Some predators eat the honey bees as a whole whereas others are parasitic, sucking the life out of the bees. In this article, we will discuss how to protect honey and mason bees from birds.

A major affliction of honey and mason bees is the chalkbrood disease, which caused by the fungus Ascosphaera Apis. The diseases afflicts colonies of the honey bee the world over. It mummifies the larvae of honey bees, leaving larvae in bee brood cells hard on the outside and white on the inside. The mummified larvae looks like a piece of chalk, hence the name chalkbrood. This disease of honey bees affects both sealed and unsealed brood in a colony. These mycelia multiply and eventually engulf the entire larvae inside the cell and kill it. This guide helps you with chalkbrood disease treatment for honey and mason bees.

Mason bees are highly sensitive and require little management when compared to the honey bee. They are particularly prone to pesticides. It is therefore the responsibility of those who use pesticides in their lawn or garden, to ensure it does not drift into the mason bee houses. Flowering plants should also be free from pesticides, since the bees forage on these plants. This is not the only challenge faced by the mason bee. Pests, parasites and predators target mason bees as well. Consequently, they should be protected. This should be an all-season work on your part, leaving no chance for these enemies of the mason bee to attack.