Feeding the Honey Bees

18 Mar, 2008
6 likes

In summer of 2006 I had some honey bees. Thousands. They came every day and swarmed the hummingbird feeders trying to get the sugarwater. So I started giving them their own trays. This is a plastic lid and a towel soaked with sugarwater, and of course, bees. They were very passive. I only got stung a few times and that was when I accidentally pinched one under my arm. I had to stop using deodorant because that's what was attracting them to my arm. Since there are no beekeepers around here I was told that this was probably a natural hive very close to my house. Natural hives are very rare these days because of the parasite problem. I never could find the hive. In 2007 I had very few honey bees come to my yard. They just disappeared.

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Jacque

Wow think il have ago at that this summer :)

19 Mar, 2008

Lori

Hi Diohio...i have a question for you... where would the bees make their hive...am I right to think that it would be in a cavity in a tree or perhaps underground? Do they ever make paper nests? Only wasps make paper nests? right? until recently I thought that honey bees were always social but was surprised to read that there are solitary bees. Have you heard this too?

19 May, 2008

Diohio

Hi Lori, Honey bees would be in a tree cavity.......it's the yellow jackets that build a nest in the ground a lot of times. I've seen hornets build paper nests usually hanging from a tree limb.
Honey bees are solitary bees? They all belong to a hive, I thought, and work for that hive, which would make them social.........I thought>?? Maybe I don't know what solitary and social means in bees.

21 May, 2008

Lori

hmmm...cause for more research lol.The eastern carpenter bee, the alfalfa leafcutter bee, the orchard mason bee are all what are called solitary bees because they are primarily pollenators, they do not produce honey or wax...every female is fertile and makes her own nest and feeds her brood nectar, they are usually plant specific..All this according to Wiki... I had always believed that all bees were communal...

22 May, 2008

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