For those interested in mason bees for pollinating, I'm building a house for them

[pepperhead212]

I was planning on doing this, even before the recent corona virus scare, telling us to stay at home as much as possible. I always spend a lot of time in my workshop, except in heavy gardening seasons!

I got the idea for this when I saw some of the mason bee houses for sale, and I said "Hey, that would be easy to make!" Maybe not really easy, but it was easy to draw up the plans, and once I did that, it was easy! I haven't finished it, but the most time consuming work is done, cutting all those grooves.

First, I got some cheap cedar (a wood suggested for the bees, since finishing is not necessary), being sold at clearance because it was bowed, and nobody would buy it for deck-making! I cut them to 4' pieces, then put them on a workbench, with spacers, to let them stabilize. Then I jointed one side, until totally flat, then planed them all, to 3/4 thick. It is only 5.5" wide, and wider would have been better, but I didn't want to rout it lengthwise, as it seemed it would be weaker that way, in the thin sections.

I first cut 9 pieces, 6 5/16" wide, to make the 11 cross grain router cuts, on both sides of the piece, with a 5/16" cove box bit, set to 5/32" deep, so the 2 cuts on opposing pieces meet to make a 5/16" diameter hole.

First cut:
First set of cuts on router table, using a 5/16 inch cove box bit. by pepperhead212, on Flickr

Last cut:
Last cut, at least with the router. by pepperhead212, on Flickr

Unfortunately, cedar is a wood that splinters a lot, and after each set of cuts, I had to take a piece of sandpaper, wrapped around a ¼" dowel, to clean out the grooves, and the splinters sticking up. Here is a photo, showing those splinters, and cleaning them out. It didn't take long, for each set of 16.

Cleaning out the grooves, using a 1/4 inch dowel, wrapped around 120 grit sandpaper. by pepperhead212, on Flickr

Here are the finished inserts, showing how it looks like 88 holes were drilled, all the way through.
The wood, loosely stacked, showing the future home for 88 mason bees. by pepperhead212, on Flickr

All I have to do now, is make a "cage", to hold them in, and protect them - the easy part of the job. I'll post that later. I would have started it tonight, but I try not to do anything noisy after 9 pm, since my neighbors would definitely hear it!

 

[PrincessFiona60]

Love it, I also encourage Mason Bees, even though I only grow flowers in my yard.

 

[Vinylhanger]

That's really cool. I'm going to do the simple style for our garden and orchard.

Just doug fir 2x drilled. They love doug fir around here.

 

[larry_stewart]

Looks great!
I haven't taken on a project like that in year, since I used to build bird houses with my kids.
Maybe ill give something like this a go in the near future. Thanks for sharing.

 

[pepperhead212]

I've almost finished the bee house today, all except for attaching the back, as I have to get a couple of SS straight braces, for mounting it outside.

Gluing up boards, to make the sides and shelves. by pepperhead212, on Flickr

Cutting one board at a 10 degree angle, to form the sides. by pepperhead212, on Flickr

Assembled house, shown from the front. by pepperhead212, on Flickr

Bee house, from the side. by pepperhead212, on Flickr

Bee house from the back, with a piece of plexiglass that will be screwed on. by pepperhead212, on Flickr

I spent much of today in the workshop, doing just general maintenance things, while the glue dried in the various steps. I always say, cleaning up takes longer than most projects, even though the dust collector helps greatly with that.

 

[bbqcoder]

Looks good! I would like to see more pictures of your tools & shop. I want to be able to drool.

This project is a great idea and I hope to do one. But first, my plan is to make a new garden gate, 2 more raised beds, and a small covered hoop house.

 

[pepperhead212]

I take it you are a woodworker, bbqcoder, besides the raised beds, of course! I was also going to make another bed, but I was going to "borrow" a friend's son, to do the heavy work, and with this lockdown, I had to put that off until another time. I'm sure I'll find other things to do, like start my seeds!

I got some more cleaned up today. I removed the large saw blades and cleaned them - they had a lot of pitch from the cedar, and previous pine I worked with. Now they look brand new!

Here are photos of many of the things in my workshop. There's another workbench not included - the one with all the paint and finishing supplies, electrical supplies, wrenches, sockets, and many other hand tools.

The best plan I ever found for my workshop was in WOOD Magazine, sometime in the 90s, when they posted a plan for a cyclone dust collection system, which were fairly new at the time, and expensive. It was inexpensive, and easy to make, and it has saved me countless hours of cleanup time, through the years.
Homemade cyclone dust collection system. by pepperhead212, on Flickr

The table and miter saw, and a few other things. by pepperhead212, on Flickr

Most of my drills, with a couple that I don't use much elsewhere. by pepperhead212, on Flickr

Bandsaw, planer, and lathe, on the far wall. by pepperhead212, on Flickr

Jointer and drum sander. by pepperhead212, on Flickr

My main bench, with many of my most used tools and hardware nearby. by pepperhead212, on Flickr

I store a LOT of things overhead - otherwise, I don't know where I'd be able to put them! by pepperhead212, on Flickr

This is a way I can keep myself busy, among other hobbies. I just have to make sure that I don't eat so much - another favorite hobby!

 

[Dawgluver]

Nice! I'm a bee fan. And a shop fan, thanks for the tour!

 

[bbqcoder]

I take it you are a woodworker, bbqcoder, besides the raised beds, of course!

Nice shop! I wouldn’t say that I’m a woodworker but I do appreciate fine tools. I did woodworking in high school but I don’t have the room or time right now. I do hope to build a new shed this year that I will take pictures of. It will be a large salt box shed. The last one I built was seven years ago and documented in this thread: https://www.diychatroom.com/f49/diycoders-shed-project-178512/

 

[pepperhead212]

Nice shed! I never took woodworking in high school - I've been self-taught, since I moved into this house, in 'late '83, and slowly accumulated the tools I needed.

 

[RCJoe]

My Mason Bees like to make music.

I can't keep them out there. I have several sets of these around my home as I have a front and rear deck. I love the tone of these tubular chimes in the breeze. But it seems the bees prefer atonality, which their nesting in the chimes creates.

 

[pepperhead212]

Here's the finished bee house - I had to get those straight SS brackets, to hang it from, and they took a long time to get here (one of those 3rd party sellers on Amazon). No big deal, as I'm not putting it up right away. I also had to order that hardware cloth, but that came right away.
Mason bee house, ready to hang. by pepperhead212, on Flickr

And here's the scraper I made, to clean out the cocoons with, in the fall. I just drew the design on the piece of wood, and cut out the empty sections with the bandsaw, then I rounded away the ends of the sections by nibbling them away on the bandsaw, until the fit in just right, then I tapered it toward the front on both sides on the belt sander. It fits great now!
Wooden scraper I made for scraping out the mason bee cocoons, in the fall. by pepperhead212, on Flickr

Sometime in May I'll get the bees for it, and put it up.

 

[Cooking Goddess]

Wow, nice house for those lucky little bees.

 

[GA Home Cook]

Pepperhead, Nice! i have just purchased a Mason Bee house from Costco. Should I hang it now? Also when do you bring it in? How many weeks before the first frost?

 

[pepperhead212]

GA HC It's a little early here, but not sure what it would be down there. I'm waiting until May. Here's a link, where I learned the most about mason bees, after the host on Growing A Greener World visited the company in a show (Season 10, episode 2...maybe it can be streamed?), and it got my attention! They have a number of videos there, showing how to raise them. This is where I saw the design for the house, with layers of wood, which can be separated, and the cocoons removed, to be used next year (I don't have kids in my house, so storing them in the fridge isn't a problem.). They also sell a plastic scraper, which gave me the idea for making the wood scraper.
https://crownbees.com/super-pollinators-spring

 

[GA Home Cook]

thanks Dave that was very interesting. I would like to see your nests, and mine, posted here during the year. My first attempt so I am sure there will be questions during the year. I have mine on a post at the garden. I will snap a picture today.

Thanks again,

Hal

 

[pepperhead212]

I got that mason bee house in! Since I'm seeing flowers all over out there, including tomatoes and eggplants starting up, I took the mason bee cocoons out if the fridge, put them in the front of the house I made, and installed the house. I also sprayed some mason bee attractant on the house - hopefully, this will keep them here, and maybe attract more from around here.
Mason bee house hung up, with the cocoons slowly opening up. by pepperhead212, on Flickr

I collected some heavy clay soil, and put it in a container, with some drainage holes, and with something to prop it open, so the bees could get to it, then sprayed it with some more of that attractant. They need clay to make the cocoons with, and actually sell the clay! I figured I'd rather do it this way.
Container of clay, for the mason bees. by pepperhead212, on Flickr

Clay container, propped opened so that the bees can access it. by pepperhead212, on Flickr

 

[larry_stewart]

Really looks great Pepper. What kind of maintenance is there on a mason bee house?

 

[pepperhead212]

Larry From what I've read, there's not much to do now, except wait...and hope! Eventually, when the bees slow down, and eventually stop showing up there, I'll have to take the house and cover it, to keep insect predators out - they sell a very fine tulle like cover specifically for this, but I figured I could use some of the thin Agribon I have. And I figured I'll put it in my basement, until fall, when I'll remove the cocoons (they make a plastic device, to scrape them out with, so I duplicated that, with some scrap wood!), and refrigerate them, until next spring.

 

[pepperhead212]

And here's a good episode on Growing A Greener World, that you might want to see:
Mason Bee Revolution