My father-in-law is a master gardener who has a way with mason bees. He makes his own condos and puts them up on the southeast side of the garage. On Sunday the females were incredibly busy laying eggs and plugging the holes. Look at all the colors of clay they have found in the neighborhood. Isn't it amazing! You can see a couple of bees in the tunnel ends as well. This year it took a while before the females hatched because of the cool weather. The males have been out for weeks, but we had cold, windy weather and the blossoms of my FIL's crap apple tree were blown off before the females emerged. I really noticed how much larger the females are when I saw one land on the sidewalk the other day. I was so used to seeing the little males that I had to do a double take to realize it was a female mason bee.
Luckily, we have had a reprieve in the weather and the females are pollinating their little hearts out!
Here you can see the roof overhang protects the condos nicely.
As you can see, there are about 6 condos here and they are filling up fast. The ones closer to the east are filling up first.
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