I opened my mason bee house yesterday to see what was inside, I had lovely mason bee cocoons and also a little surprise.
There was a cigar like tube in a couple of the trays, and I thought "What the heck is that?!?"
So onto my trusted iPad I sent my husband and he googled "what bees use leaves for nest cells" the answer..... Leaf cutter bees!
http://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Megachilidae
I am so excited that I have two types of solitary bee babies in my bee house.
I carefully removed all mason bee cocoons and leaf cutter tubes from the trays in my bee house. After reading online about the leaf cutter bee you do not want to get their leafy cocoons wet, so I just removed them and placed them in a cardboard box.
The mason bees however I removed all cocoons individually and placed them in cold water to wash off any mud and mites that may be on them.
I followed the instructions I received from WestCoast seeds where I purchased my first 24 mason bees early this spring.
https://www.westcoastseeds.com/productdetail/Gardening-Supplies/Pollination/Mason-Bee-Cocoons/#sthash.aERY1iCA.dpbs
After washing and drying my mason bees I placed them in a cardboard box then put them in the wooden hibernation box I painted for them along with the leaf cutter bee cocoons and put them in the fridge.
There they will hang out until spring when I will release them for pollination, with any luck I won't need to buy bees again!
I know I have some live bees because when I was washing them I accidentally squeezed one of the cocoons a little to much and it began to vibrate!
This has been one of the coolest experiences in nature I've had. So educational!
Here is a link to the pictures I took while opening and cleaning my bee house and cocoons.
http://youtu.be/4pmDUb-j5Jk
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