The leafcutter bee is a gentle pollinator who lays its eggs in long, thin, tubes, be that in wood or other material. It lays eggs one at a time in the tube, sealing each in with a cut out leaf. The eggs then hatch, and the young push their way out of the tube and into the world. From reading up on them, we’ve found that the rose leaf has just the right level of thickness and strength for these bees to use for their young.
These are the kinds of bees we’ll be building habitats for – those who lay eggs in long, thin tubes.
Today, Jamie and I returned to the bamboo patch to harvest more bamboo. Like an intrepid explorer, Jamie ventured into the patch to cut more bamboo at an optimal thickness, leveling it with her reciprocating saw and dragging it out into the open. From there, I trimmed it down, and piled it up.
Overall, I believe we harvested more bamboo than we did last week. We carried the collection back to the greenhouse in the back of Jamie’s car, and left it there for Patrick to pick up at his convenience. He will then take it and cut it down into the segments that we will use to build our habitats, once he manages to get our bamboo haul home. Good luck, Patrick!
We’re excited about the state of our project coming out of our review with Dr. K on Thursday. The habitats we finish by Earth Day can be hung across campus to be a part of the festivities here at PSU Berks. This also gives us an opportunity to design some creative signage to accompany them for this day, a chance that I’d love to tackle. We will be busy bees this semester, looking to finish our bee hotels in time for Earth Day!
Until next time, BEE safe and have a BEEutiful spring break!
Bees are so important to our environment, I think this is a great way to make a change and provide them the environment that they need.