Oh happy day!
I uncovered three bumblebee queens while rototilling the garden today. They look like bombus impatiens, which are commonly raised in captivityThey're spending the winter in my refrigerator.
Amazingly, every one of them went through the tines of the tiller, and I stepped on one, but they all look fine.
Look out in the spring the one you steped on might remember!!!!!!!!
Mitch KD8IMF
That's great!
Can you tell us more about the location you found them. leaf/straw cover? full sun? about how deep? etc...
Do you have a protocol for storing them in the frig?
They were in full sun, fairly soft ground that might have been covered by watermelon vines when they dug in(bare now), they were less than two inches deep. There is a small pile of woodchips nearby but they were at least a foot away from it.
I've got them in tiny Glad ware containers with lots of slits in the top and bottom and some shredded leaves. I put the small containers in a larger one with a damp paper towel for humidity and then covered it loosely.
According to Befriending Bumblebees that should do it.hrug:
I've never tried to keep bumblebees alive overwinter. I do know the biology of bumbles. Only the mated queens survive through the winter. Are you trying to keep the workers alive?
>According to Befriending Bumblebees that should do it.
What does this site say? I'd be interested to see if you can keep the old queen and her workers alive in your frige.
Originally Posted by Michael Palmer
I've never tried to keep bumblebees alive overwinter. I do know the biology of bumbles. Only the mated queens survive through the winter. Are you trying to keep the workers alive?
>According to Befriending Bumblebees that should do it.
What does this site say? I'd be interested to see if you can keep the old queen and her workers alive in your frige.
No workers, just three queens that I turned up with the rototiller. I got the procedure from the book, couldn't find it on the web.
The book is available Here:
http://shop.extension.umn.edu/Public...l.aspx?ID=1902
bumbles
dcross,
Nice find! Definitely queens. Did you know that you can start a bumble colony in spring with each of the queens that you have found? Main thing you need is a bumble bee nesting box. Easy to make too.
Morris
Starting colonies in spring is my goal, planning to make starter boxes soon!
Cool! I had 'scheduled' to build bumble bee boxes this week, but have been building/rebuilding a goat barn instead. I demolished this old mini barn and am building a new one with the good hardwood thats still there. In a few of the pieces, I cut into carpenter bee tunnels and found overwintering, mature carpenter bees. I put those pieces up in a dry place and hope to re-establish them in the spring. I think carpenter bees have an untapped potential as commercial pollinators, but it may be one of my many hair-braind schemes! Either way I think they are cool and like having them around.
I also got into looking into my blackberry patch for Ceratina bees. There is a picture of them at this link.
http://www.cirrusimage.com/bees_small_carpenter.htm
Looking in my blackberry patch, I found old blackberry twigs that died probably year before last. The ends where burrowed into, and dissecting them, I found overwintering Ceratina bees. I put some of these up as well and harvested some of the larger blackberry twigs to make bundles and try and make Ceratina nests out of them in spring.
Michael E Wilson
http://rosecombapiaries.com/
Moderator
I love carpenter bees, and we have some here on our place, but I've not seen them pollinating anything besides a few species of flowers, and I haven't seen them in any of the vegetables that I can recall.
Took the queens out of the fridge the other day.
Dead, dead, and dead.
What a start!
How sad. Any idea what happened? Or perhaps it just wasn't meant to be.
“The keeping of bees is like the direction of sunbeams.” -Henry David Thoreau
They were still alive in Jan or Feb, I figure it got too dry in there.
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