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Bees in compost bin
Marigold7
Posts: 4
A couple of weeks ago, we noticed about 20 bees round rim of our compost bin who then built a hanging honeycomb structure - see photos. About a week later, they left - was it too hot for them or was there no queen for the nest? Were they honey bees and might they come back?
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Thanks pansyface. Disappointed that they moved on and after all that work too! We do have a very bee-friendly garden, so fingers crossed.
Hubby discovered bees in an old fallen Eucalytus tree on our property. They have quietened down now for our winter, but were very active in summer.
what you have is a swarm comb,
once the swarm leaves the original hive they set up a small comb somewhere where they regroup and scout bee's are then sent out to find the permanent home of the swarm, once they find somewhere nice they move on.
on the plus side you have some nice bee's wax, great for antique furniture!
Thanks treehugger80 for the info - bees are endlessly fascinating creatures! Am always looking out for new plants to attract both bumbles and honey bees into the garden.
Thanks Pat E, looks as if you have an extensive property - plenty of room for you and the bees
We have 100acres of bushland in the snowy mountains region of NSW - not large by farming standards, but we don't intend to clear the land or have livestock, so when we wander around the place, we often come across unusual things, such as this bee hive.
I'm not sure how far bees travel,, but there are never a shortage of bees pollinating the plants in my garden. That particular fallen tree is quite a way from the house area, so maybe they another nest closer that we've not discovered.
Wow 100 acres - expect you share it with whole range of local wildlife! Top of our garden is minute by comparison, but quite a haven for bees and other insects who like my 'fennel forest' & comfrey patch. We had a red-tailed bumblebee nest a couple of years ago and enjoyed watching them come and go.
Recently I bumped into a nest of wasps while digging in my garden. One of them managed to stabb me in the head which i felt for days.
They do also make nests in houses which can cause a lot of damage because they eat/chew the wood to make building material for the nest. Do know whether bees or bumblebees do the same
i happily have lots of bees in the garden atm, i have a couple of leaf cutter bees in the little bee house, we built an old oak table for the garden out of timbers off of the front of a house and their are some black & white small type bees going in and out of the crevice under the table top and ive just noticed in my plastic pot of wild flowers they are entering through the arched side holes at the bottom of the pot and there are entrance holes in the soil, what type of bees could they be?
I've seen evidence of leaf-cutting bees on various plants around the house area (such as roses) but I don't know exactly what they look like. I have seen a bee with blue and white stripes on its bottom, but don't know if that s the one. I've tried to find a book on bees in Australia so that I can look out for them, but haven't been able to find a reference to such a book. We have plenty of other wildlife to watch and enjoy. Kangaroos, Wallabies, Wombats, sugar gliders, birds of many varieties, and of course introduced animals such as rabbits, hares, deer, European wasps etc.
I'll put a couple of pictures on for you to enjoy - hopefully I'm not driving everyone crazy if they've seen tham before.
Our poodle investigating a digging under a stump.
Here's some more of our wildlife
these are Cunninghams Skinks. They wander down to the house for chopped carrot in summer. mum lost about 3" from her tail (probably got away from a kookaburra) but the tail is re growing.
These iridescent wasps really seemed to like the flowers on my garlic chives. They were there every day in summer sun for ages. Don't know what they are called.
Moth caterpillar on eucalyptus leaf - forget the name - we did look it up at one time, but forget now.
Cicada - noisy in summer when they all get going
No need to identify this one!