Hosting Bees in Your Backyard: Pollinator Hotels!
Pollinator hotels are a great way to provide a habitat for native and solitary insects!
How Do Pollinator Hotels Work?
While honeybees and some other social insects live in hives, many more insects are solitary - meaning they live alone!
For example, when mason bees in the wild are ready to nest and lay eggs, a bee will dig a small hole in the ground and place a mud plug at the bottom. She will bring in nectar and pollen for the young bees to feed on when they hatch, and then lay female eggs at the back of the hole and male eggs at the front. Then, she will seal off the hole with another mud plug at the front to protect them until they hatch the next spring. When the bees hatch, they will feed on the nectar and pollen and then eventually eat their way out of the mud tube!
Photo Credit: Encyclopedia Britannica
Pollinator hotels work the same way - they are made up of tubes that emulate the holes that bees dig in the ground! So, pollinators don’t need hotels - they need safe, suitable habitat full of native plants. However, hotels can be a chance to observe pollinators more closely and teach others about insects - keep reading to find out if you should get a pollinator hotel!
Is a Pollinator Hotel Right for You?
The best things you can do for pollinators (and insects in general):
Don’t use pesticides.
Plant native plants.
If you’ve already completed these steps* and want another way to observe pollinators up close, you might want to put together a pollinator hotel!
Photo Credit: CountryMouse13, Flickr
*You do need to complete the two items above first - attracting pollinators to a yard that has been sprayed with pesticides or doesn’t have food for them is not helpful!
What Kind of Pollinator Hotel Is Best?
Pollinator hotels are usually made up of logs, tubes, or reeds with different-sized holes drilled in them.
Photo Credit: Amazon
There isn’t a one-size-fits-all pollinator hotel that you should buy or build, but they do need to meet a few requirements. First, you should be able to take apart the bee hotel to clean it. This means the tubes should be removable AND there must be a drawer! You need to clean the pollinator hotel once per year in mid-September. You can find some great tutorials on YouTube or follow these steps:
Remove the used tubes from your pollinator hotel. (You will know they have been used if they are sealed off with mud plugs!)
Using a razor blade, CAREFULLY insert the tip of the blade into mud plug and twist. Ideally, the tube will split and you will have a long cross-section where you can see all the cocoons or eggs. Remove any pollen, debris, or pests.
Carefully remove the cocoons/eggs. Put them in a bee safe, layered with paper towels; put the bee safe in the fridge. (This is completely safe for them, as it replicates cold winters they would experience underground!)
In mid-February, put them in the drawer of your pollinator hotel - the drawer should have a couple holes drilled in it for them to exit when they are ready in the spring!
Second, your pollinator hotel should ideally have tubes of different diameters to offer habitats for different types of insects. Finally, your hotel needs to offer shelter from the elements - make sure there is some type of overhang to protect the insects from the rain!
Photo Credit: Ferns and Feathers: Woodland Wildlife Gardening and Photography
Who Checked In to My Hotel?
Mason bees tend to seal the front of the tube (or the top of their nests) with a rough mud plug. On the other hand, wasps often create a smooth plug, while leafcutter bees use chewed leaves to seal the tubes.
Photo Credit: Picryl
Studying the used tubes can give you a great idea of who is staying in your pollinator hotel, but observing insects in action is the best way to find out which insects are visiting, what they are doing, and how you can be a better host!
Photo Credit: Judy Gallagher, Wikimedia Commons. Alfalfa leafcutter bee (Megachile rotundata).
Resources
The “Melittology (BEES)” and “Native Melittology (NATIVE BEES)” episodes from the Ologies podcast, hosted by Alie Ward with guests Amanda Shaw and Krystle Hickman respectively
Pollinator hotels discussed specifically in “Native Melittology” at 54:25 and 1:04:05!
“How to Build a Pollinator House” by Keith Bruno: a great set of instructions for building a pollinator house for mason bees specifically. Also contains information on mason bee nesting habits that might be of interest to current pollinator hotel hosts!
“WeeBeeHouse and tips to attract native solitary bees” by Vic MacBournie: The WeeBee House was recommended by Krystle Hickman in the “Native Melittology” episode above! Read more about this insect hotel, how to choose the best hotel, and how to make a good home for mason and leafcutter bees.
