Creating a new class for my clients at Ann’s Place is exciting and scary at the same time. My latest class is a Spring mash up of St. Patrick’s Day and creating a mason bee B&B. The St.Patrick’s Day exercise is growing shamrocks, which can be defined as wood sorrel (Oxalis acetosella), white clover (Trifolium repens) or any members of the pea family (Fabaceae) (to mention a few). Easy-peasy: A pot, a corm , seeds, and soil. No problem.
The mason bee home is entirely different.Mason bees (as well as other useful pollinators like leaf cutter bees) lay eggs in sequential cells in round tubes. To emulate this environment, Juana and I last Fall found a stand of invasive bamboo (Phyllostachys aurea) and cut down lots of stalks bundling them and placing them into the shed to dry. Because my budget for all my activities is limited to $6 a client, I need to be open and innovative in how I acquire materials. I need a board to mount the bee hotel on. Standard pine is too expensive but rough cut pine siding is less than half the price. To prepare it for my clients I just need to run it through my table saw twice and then use my chop saw to cut it into manageable pieces.
I decide to use PVC pipe for the frame of the dwelling as it is both inexpensive and durable. The chop saw set at a 22.5 degree angle creates enough overhang so the interior will stay dry. But to attach the pipe to the wood, I rely on three tiny L-brackets that I pre-drill and screw into the pipe. Now, by the way, I thought I could knock this out in a couple of hours but 6 hours into cutting and measuring I need to take a break for the day.
The next day is spent cutting bamboo so that every section has an open (where the bees will enter) and closed (where the bees will lay their first egg) end. Bamboo is a sectioned grass, making it perfect for this job. Though I thought I could cut multiple sections of bamboo with a single cut, it was not going to work forcing me to slice each 6-inch section individually. . .for 25 clients.
That’s a lot of bamboo.
