Helping Solitary Bees - will they all nest in flower pots?

Mike160304

Berghill and Jimmy have told us about Leaf-Cutter Bees nesting in their flower pots, as a bit of a nuisance (in the greenhouse I think?).

Turning this around:  If solitary bees will nest in flower pots, why am I laboriously making bee houses from bamboo cane, etc?

Does anyone have experience of what flower pots exactly to use, and how to set them up, in order to get solitary bees to nest in them?

waterbutts

They will nest in the ground if they like the look of it. Have you had any luck with your bijou residences? Put a few flower pots out anyway and see what happens. Mine found the screw holes under my wooden garden table and filled those with grubs.

LeadFarmer

I once upturned a medium sized terracota plantpot and stufed a layer of moss from my lawn inside it. Later that summer I noticed bees (bumble?) were going in & out through the drainage hole at the top. I assumed they were nesting.

waterbutts

Much better than having them fly out from under the table every five minutes. Fair puts you off yer cuppa.

Mike160304

waterbutts wrote (see)

They will nest in the ground if they like the look of it. Have you had any luck with your bijou residences? Put a few flower pots out anyway and see what happens. Mine found the screw holes under my wooden garden table and filled those with grubs.

Thanks.  My tower blocks are designer-crafted with bamboo canes . The wire mesh keeps out Woodpeckers etc. Here, the Leaf-cutter Bees have filled all the larger holes:

In June it was equally filled by bees who used mud for the door, but something, 99% probably a Woodpecker, pecked through all the doors deep into them and I decided to clean them out, add the wire mesh protection and start again. The Leaf-Cutters then came in July.

Mike

Mike160304

LeadFarmer wrote (see)

I once upturned a medium sized terracota plantpot and stufed a layer of moss from my lawn inside it. Later that summer I noticed bees (bumble?) were going in & out through the drainage hole at the top. I assumed they were nesting.

Thanks very much. I have heard of Bumble Bees nesting in old mouse nests, so this sounds a bit similar. I guess that not eough rain went through the drainage hole to bother them.

I think I'll suddenly get interested in terracotta flower pots, to my wife's surprise.

Mike

Mike160304

Compost, compost . . . . this word keeps cropping up here.

Perhaps bees especially like compost because it is not sandy and when they burrow in it, it does not fall in like soil would.

For next spring I am thinking of large upside-down flower pots with moss in to try to attract Bumble Bees, and any flower pots, right way up or upside down or whatever, full of compost, facing SE, to try to attract the other solitary bees.

Mike

Dovefromabove

  Even more incentive to rake the moss out of the lawn 

michelle white2

I have two large plant pots full of old dry soil,small bumble bees are nesting in both pots which side by side,i have noticed them since last summer.the pots are outside my front door,should I move them elsewhere or will this disturb them.Michelle

Dovefromabove

They've chosen those pots in their wisdom because they are ideally situated for them - if you move them you may not choose such a good spot and they will leave, or worse, they may perish 

jatnikapyar

As Leadfarmer says, halves of broken flower pots on soil on top of dried moss and grass does work, especially if they have access like a drainage hole on top.