Gene discovered that his bee refrigerator, a converted wine storage refrigerator cabinet, had malfunctioned and the blue orchard bees were emerging from their cocoons. Not an April Fool's joke!
We decided to place them in the herb garden, the old Site1a2a, next to the greenhouse that we have used this year for our enclosed bee studies. The greenhouse is now way too hot for BOBs.
We placed approximately 50 BOB cocoons in a shaded cardboard box between the herb garden and the orange tree. In the last few days we have notices significant (honey) bee, leaf cutter bee and hummingbird activities around the newly emerging flowers.
We noted that many bees had emerged in the first half hour. The temperature climbed quickly from the 70s (deg F) to 100 deg F by 1130 am. We will now monitor the habitats and check for bee nesting activity.
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