Sooke Garden Club March 25: The buzz about mason bees

By Cory McInnis

Bzzzz, you often hear them before noticing them Mason bees buzzing around your flowers, trees, dandelions … anything flowering. The Mason bee, with a life span of just six to eight weeks, is a very important bee. Native to the area, they are heavy lifters for the pollinating world.

You can find Mason bee houses and tubes in most garden centres, or better yet, hand made from someone local in your community. The houses are integral for the bees to nest in, although I have seen them burrow into any small hole.

Early risers come out in the first part of spring, just in time for the early fruit trees, berries and spring flowers. It’s said that two mature females can pollinate an entire maple tree. That’s a lot of work for two bees – “busy as a bee” is no joke.

When Garry Fletcher retired in 2004 from teaching biology and marine environmental systems at Pearson College, he started to culture Mason bees. Living on his farm, he created homes by putting out some tubes of the reed grass Phragmites, leading to increased production of fruit and vegetables on his farm and his son’s organic vegetable operation, Wind Whipped Farm.

Garry has learned how to cultivate the cocoons to get the best production of the cocoons and parasite control. You may have seen him at Seedy Saturday events with his cocoons, also available for sale directly from his farm in Metchosin.

Sooke Garden Club members and drop-in guests ($5) are invited to hear from Garry on Wednesday, March 25 at 7 pm at St. Rose of Lima Catholic Church. If you’d like to become a garden club member, learn more online at sookegardenclub.ca or email at Sookegc@gmail.com. Learn more about the club on Facebook and Instagram.