Antique Bee Houses
I'll bet you've never seen Native Bee houses like these before! Denise loves to find antique wooden artifacts at flea markets and garage sales, and is the first to imagine them as homes for Native Bees. Add the woodcrafting skills of Jim Murphy, and these one-of-a-kind pieces become stunning yard ornaments. Recycling at its best! The bottoms are protected to prevent rotting, and metal stabilizing bars are included with the taller pieces. All nesting holes come pre-filled with both outer protective tubes and inner nesting straws.
If you'd like more details about these Antique Bee Houses, or if you'd like to purchase one online, click here to go to our Store!
 |
|
| Antique corbel recycled as a Native Bee house. | Old staircase newell post transformed into a decorative Native Bee house. |
 |  |
| Rare Asian wood Bee House with copper roof. | 24 nesting holes and original hand-carvings. |
Protein Diet or Carb Diet? Both!
Like all bees, Orchard Mason Bees collect flower pollen as a protein source for their young, and get their energy from the sweet nectar the flowers produce to attract them.
Maybe not so cuckoo after all?
Cuckoo bees enter the nests of solitary bees while the female is away and then lay a hidden egg. When the Cuckoo bee larva hatches, it consumes both the host larva's pollen ball and the host larva itself. So the Orchard Mason Bee does all the work and the Cuckoo bee reaps all the benefit!
There were NO honey bees on the North American continent until the 1630’s when the colonists brought them to Jamestown, Virginia so they could harvest their honey.