Mason bee
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Mason bee is a general term for certain species of bees in the family Megachilidae, primarily the genus Osmia, such as the orchard mason bee (Osmia lignaria), the blueberry bee (Osmia ribifloris), and the hornfaced bee (Osmia cornifrons). They are named from their habit of making compartments of mud in their nests, which are made in hollow reeds or holes in wood made by wood boring insects. The former two are native to the Americas and the latter to Japan although lignaria and cornifrons have been moved from their native ranges for commercial purposes.
Mason bees are increasingly cultivated to improve pollination for early spring fruit flowers. They are used sometimes as an alternative, but more often as an augmentation for honeybees.
Unlike honeybees (Apis mellifera), they are solitary; every female is fertile and makes her own nest, and there are no worker bees for these species. Solitary bees produce neither honey nor beeswax. They are immune from acarine and varroa mites, but have their own unique parasites, pests and diseases.
Most mason bees live in holes and can be attracted by drilling short holes in a block of wood. They are excellent spring season pollinators and, since they have no honey to defend, will only sting if squeezed or stepped on. As such, they make excellent garden "pets", since they both pollinate the plants and are safe for children and pets.
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[edit] Life Cycle
[edit] Spring
A mason bee begins its life as a tiny egg laid on top of a pollen/nectar provision left by its mother. When it hatches, the provision provides food for the larva as it goes through many changes on its way to becoming an adult. It lives in the dark, as its mother laid the egg inside a narrow tube with cell partitions separated by mud. In front and behind it are its brothers and sisters, who are also going through the same ordeal: living in the dark and eating their provision.
[edit] Summer
By the early summer, the larva begins spinning a cocoon around itself and enter the pupa stages of its development. By now it has consumed all of its provision and will not eat again until it emerges the following spring.
[edit] Fall and Winter
The young bee is a fully developed insect hibernating inside its insulatory cocoon. Here it will remain over the winter, staying as warm as it can against the cold. They have evolved to handle the cold quite nicely. Most Osmia species are found in places where the temperature drops below 0°C for long durations, like northern Canada. If bees aren't properly over-wintered, their emergence can be delayed or sped up. Farmers are known to exploit their emergence cycle to time their release with the first blossoms of their orchards.
[edit] Spring Again
The bees emerge from their cocoons. The males are the first to come out. They hang around the nest site waiting for the females. When the females emerge, the first thing they do is mate. O. lignaria females will only mate once or twice. Then they feed for several days while their ovaries develop. They are absent from the nesting site during this period, but they are building up their fat reserves and readying themselves for the next part of the life cycle. The males, once mating season is over, die off. Only the females remain for the duration of spring.
O. lignaria females like to nest in narrow holes or tubes. Bee keepers usually put out some premade nesting materials in order to entice the females to choose these tubes over other possible sites in the neighbourhood. Rain, wind, and free-release (the practise of letting loose cocoons out rather than letting them emerge in their natal nests) all discourage females from returning to their birthing site.
When they are ready to nest, the females seek out a suitable hole for laying their eggs. A female might inspect several potential nests before settling in. Once she had found the right nest, she flies outside of the hole and does a sort-of inflight dance. This is so she can orient on major visual features in order that she can find her nest.
She begins by collecting mud and building the first partition. Then she starts making trips to nearby flowers. Unlike honeybees who prefer flowers that are miles away, she will choose flowers that are nearby. She can visit 75 flowers per trip and it takes about 25 trips to create a complete pollen/nectar provision mass. She will work tirelessly during the day, only stopping once the sun has gone down. When the sun rises the next morning, she begins again.
Once a provision mass is complete, she backs into the hole and lays an egg. Then she collects more mud to seal off the partition, which doubles as the back of the next cell. The process continues until she has filled the tube, leaving about an inch of space in front without any eggs. She lays the female eggs in the back of the burrow, and the male eggs towards the front. She'll lay more male eggs overall, about three to every one female.
Once she has finished with the nest, she plugs the entrance to the tube with mud by placing it flush with the wall, and then seeks out another nest. She will work tirelessly until she dies. An O. lignaria female lives for about four to eight weeks and she can complete an average of four 6-inch tubes in her lifetime, with about eight eggs per tube. That's about 60,000 blossons per bee, and for this reason farmers have cultivated the insect for use on domestic farms.
[edit] See also
[edit] External links
- Orchard Mason Bees Gardening in Western Washington
[edit] Further reading
Pollination with Mason Bees, Dr. Margeriet Dogterom
How to Manage the Blue Orchard Bee, Bosch & Kempde: Mauerbienen
fr: Osmia
