Feb 17,2020 working on tubes

cutting, shaping and installing black-bamboo tubes into condo-1
got about one third of condo-1 completed
target date range for completion is April 1-14

New Year's day 2020 (Chinese)

New Year's day for Chinese

January 25, 2020

Getting ready for Pi day  March 14, 2020
For some reason Mason Bees love Pi day.

I have got to chop down another black bamboo and fix
up some tubes.  Less than 3 months until Pi day.

Watching the Boeing 777x doing its first flight on youtube.

January 24, 2020 Mason bees

The weather is cold and raining.  Mid day is around the 50 degree F level.
Also my callsign KK7JB is official.   I plan to join the Sunday night
net meeting for the Federal Way hams.

I have on mason bee almost populated with both black bamboo sticks and
 paper tubes. 

I did not have good results last fall with the paper tubes.  So most of the tubes this year will be made of the black bamboo.

It is so wet and cold there is not much chance of loading the new bamboo tubes.

Chinese new year is tomorrow. Hope the bees are energized .

Our Federal Way Amateur Club is planning on building some magnetic loop antennas.  The president says he has a stock of aluminum of a good size for the antennas. He also says he has some air variable capacitors (essential part for such an antenna).

November 28, 2019

Working on the tubes for the mason bees.  This year I will have a combination

of black-bamboo tubes and paper-tubes.

So far I have enough tubes for one condo.  Over the next two weeks I will have to

make more paper tubes and bamboo tubes.

November 18, 2019 Cutting black bamboo tubes

It is a long way until pi day. None the less, I am working on the mason bee condos.

Fortunately, I acquired a ¨clum¨ of black bamboo twenty years ago.  Since that time I have
tended to the bamboo.  It is a great species which has great features. Just the type of bamboo
which mason bees will like.

Once a single piece is about three years old it is ready for harvest.  I have already cut two or three
pieces.  I cut each piece into 4 to 5 inch lengths, The end often can contain the natural blockage.
In any case the tubes must be stuck to the back of the condo.

I happened to get a pair of shears a few years ago. The shear have a replaceable blade. This is essential because the bamboo must be cut and NOT cracked. A sharp pair of shears is essential.

I plan to have a mix of paper tubes and bamboo tubes. I do not plan to use the routed wood shelves which came with the little condos.

October 16, 2019 Reset for the mason bee house

I removed all the cocoons from the bamboo tubes.  I found lots of parasitic
wasp larvae. I found may fungus layden cocoons.

I saved roughly 60 cocoons.  I hope I did a good job. We shall see on or about
pi-day, 2020.

I plan to use a mix of the wood trays, new bamboo tubes and diy paper tubes.
We will see if any of my work is rewarded with filled tubes.

I mounted the cleaned house on the side of my shed.  I put the cocoons in a air screen
type of bag.

Nothing more to do.  Now we just wait for results in 5 months.

harvesting the cocoons October 13, 2019 Sunday

I have not done this before.   None the less, I attempted to harvest my mason bee
cocoons.
use
My bee house is divided into two types of places for cocoons

First there is the routed out wood which was supposed to be a favorite place for the
mason bees to deposit their larvae.  They completed avoided putting ANY larvae into
the routed out wood.  So much for that !

Second there is the bamboo tubes.  Approximated 60 percent of the tubes were used by
the mason bees.

In a very few cases, there were 5 or 6 cocoons.  In most cases there were only one or two cocoons.
The mason bees would seal up the tube in though the bee only put one or two larvae.
It was like someone told the bees of the concept of a Potemkin village.  If I my propose a
theory, I think the bees do this on purpose .  I think they put one larvae in a tube to throw off the parasitic wasps. 

I did find a few 6 larvae tubes.  In a very few cases, there was no nasty fungus and no nasty wasp larvae.

I harvested the cocoons. I washed them. Then I dried them off and put them in a breathable plastic
bad and put them into the bee house. I covered the bad with quarter inch hardware cloth.

August 6, 2019

Here one of my large bumble bees is enjoying a bloom from a rose of sharon bush.

I just discovered that my great grandfather was born on a Saturday on the date March 15.

So  his birthday is one day past pi day.

Because I want good flowers in the middle of March, I plant many blueberry plants.

I have be playing around with the soil. So today I went to Starbucks and after buying a coffee, I asked if I could get a bag of used coffee grounds.  They provided me with a huge bag,  I put them

around the base of my Duke variety.,   We will see what happens.

august 4 Bumble Bees are happy

Got bumble bees and they are happy.

In particular, I try to have an artichoke flower in the summer.

Here is a video where one of our local talent has found the flower

August 5, 2019 Bumble Bee gets her own artichoke flower

Here is a bumble bee enjoying an artichoke.

I don´t plant artichokes to eat.  I just provide them for the bumble bees.

At this time of year there is no mason bee activity. But the bumble bees are in full force.

My garden includes many summer flowers, so bumble bees are very plentiful in my garden.

Hoaxes   are fun to review

June 19

I installed 1/4 inch hardware cloth over the face of condo #2
Hopefully that will protect the cocoons from hungry birds

June 13

I bought some new dowels. I compared sizes to the hole sizes used in condo#2.
I also bought some quarter inch grid hardware cloth.  I need to cut a piece and fit it
over the condo#2 to protect the cocoons from hungry birds.

june 7

Bumble Bees are plentiful this year.
Of course, mason bees are done for the season.

June 6

Lots of bumblebees on flowers.  Lavender is very popular with the bumblebees.
I have an artichoke plant with a growing bud.   The weather is in the 50s so inspecting
the garden is not very comfortable today.

June 5

Checked the mason bee condos today.  No change, So basically the season is over.
I am going to get the dowels and start rolling paper tubes for next spring. 
I have a large crop of bamboo so I will use both bamboo and paper tubes for next spring.
 I certainly will not roll large diameter tubes.

June 3

Returning to my mason bee condos very soon for inspection.
I really don't think there is any more activity

May 29 some musings about counting and time

Warm today in Austin Texas
The weather people say occasional showers are due over the next few
days. The sky looks dark, so it is certainly likely.

Observing local flowers, I have seen no bees of any kind.  On the other hand,
people don't seem to plant a great many flowering plants.  The most common seems
to be the red yucca. It has a very narrow flower spike and the small red flowers
are currently blooming.


Today
I added a new time page and a page devoted to how Fred Flintstone figured out how to count.
I have seen methods which several primitive societies developed.  But the use of 12 and 60
are the two systems used by most of the western societies.

I think the idea of a base ten has little or nothing to do with Fred Flintstone type people.
See my pages for my point of view.

May 28

Ok, I have been traveling. I visited Wichita Kansas and checked to see the vegetation in the area. Moved on to Austin Texas.

My daughter has an apartment in Austin and luckily she has access to the grounds with a nearly limitless source of Tillandsia recurvata.   I will see if I can help her sell the stuff. Most people in the area view the plant as trash, so picking it up is no problem.

Some experts say the Austin area never has temperatures lower than freezing. Yet other experts say the temperatures do drop below freezing for a very few nights per year.  Other experts say freezing temperatures will nearly instantly kill Tillandsia while other experts claim a short term freezing temperature will not kill the plant. 

Hard to know which expert to believe. 

I may set up a max/min thermometer to check the actual range.  Then if I notice Tillandsia is killed or survived, we will have some real data.

May 23

No action at all today.  I really think the mason bee thing is finished for the year.
Now I just wait for October.

May 22

No activity on the bee condos.  I think the life cycle of the mason
bee is over for adults. Now the egg is developing into the pupa
and as the cocoon develops a new generation is coming for next
March

May 21

Some ducks and geese at Country Lake 

May 20

While some sources say the end of the mason bee life cycle is May 30, it looks like I am
not getting any visitors.
I think the life cycle is over.
I will remove the tubes in October and put them away.
Also, I will make paper tubes of the correct size to replace them.

I am going to keep an eye on the tubes but it does not appear any
new tubes are being filled and no bees seem to be visiting.

May 18 bumble bees plentiful

Today in applied a two layer piece of aluminum foil on the west side of
condo#2.   This will reflect the setting sun so that the temperature will not get
excessive.

The bumble bees in this region seem plentiful this year.

I saw one bee working on her tube today.

protecting the cocoons

Some mason bee keepers use hardware cloth to protect the cocoon nests from raiding birds.
I plan to fit some hardware cloth over the front of the condo #2.

My new chromebook

I  just got an Asus Chromebook.  It works pretty well.  My old hp Chromebook became a problem and since it was 5 years old and it was low cost, it wasn't worth fixing it.   New Asus has a touch screen
and the speed seems good.   According to specs, I am supposed to get 10 hours worth of battery.
Ten hours is good because I hate being connected to an ac line.  I only had to pay $300 so it was
an easy decision. 

I have a  video camera (Canon) but I usually use my smartphone.  I take photos then email the photos to myself.

Then I go to my email and save the photo to Chromebook.  Then I go to blogger and load the photo
to this blog.  It is pretty quick and the photos are good from my smartphone.

Tillandsia recurvata from Austin, Texas

I took some black bamboo and cut various lengths. Then I tied the tubes together with a piece
of wire.  I purchased a drinking glass at a dollar store and inserted pups from Tillandsia recurvata (this is the correct spelling for the ¨small ball moss¨ )  into the ends of the bamboo.  I put water in the bottom of the glass.

I capped the glass with a piece of plastic.  I may try small glass vases, that seems like an attractive place for Tillandsia. (On May 18, I removed the plastic from the glass. Many people on web say you should not totally close the ¨terrerium¨.

We will see how this works.    If this does well, I will return to the dollar store and buy more
glasses. (My black bamboo is the type which does not run. It grows very slowly. I have two clums (clum is the name for a group of bamboo stalks)  and each only produces 3 to 5 new shoots twice per year.  Still, it is enough for most of my uses.)


Also, I have mounted pups all over my yard. Several are tucked in the bark of some trees and some
are fitted into gaps in my fence.  We will see how the pups develop.

A friend of mine lives in Texas, I saw the Tillandsia laying in balls the size of tennis balls.  He told me it is a nuisance which grows in the trees and falls to the ground whenever there is rain or
wind.  He didn't know what it was and I told him.   He was happy to have me collect some.  Next time I visit him I will load up a large box and mail it to myself.

 think I will take a photo that does not have the Venetian blind in the background.

Most people go on a trip and during the trip, they purchase a souvenir.  I also like souvenirs but I like to collect some local plant and make my own totally unique souvenir.  Nobody has anything like my black bamboo mini-terrarium with Tillandsia recurvata.  For me, it is my Austin, Texas souvenir.

May 16 Three photos including the poor dead mason bee (RIP)

I added a few paper tubes to the condo to see if accepted 

so sad, a mason bee died on the ledge of the bee condo #2. Must have run out of the life cycle. Some estimates say end of the cycle is the end of May, so this is close

notice how full the right side of the condo #2 is.   very few tubes are unfilled on this date

Some of the tubes are fairly large diameter.

Notice the extra tubes (made from white paper). So far,  the bees have avoided any of the white paper tubes.

Yesterday I became impatient with two of the mason bee tubes I purchased online.

One of the tubes contained a LIVE male bee (very small bee). All the rest of the cocoons were dead.

I examined the other tube and found one live female.  She looked in good health.

Let me pause to count my chickens before they hatch.

I  have about 60 tubes.  If each tube contains 10 females.  Then if all cocoons emerge on the Ides of March next year, then I will get approximately 600 bees.    I had better have lots of tubes ready for next year.   Now adding some realism, I will say only 300 bees will survive to hatch on Pi day.

Each bee will need 10 tubes , so I will need to produce 3,000 tubes. I think I  will provide some bamboo tubes.  I don't have confidence in the routed wood.  There was something wrong with the scent on the wood...my guess.   Maybe I will wash the routed-wood. Maybe that will help.

H ___ E ___L___ P what species of bumble bee is this?

oo

which species of the bumblebee is this?   I have many of these during this time of mid-May
I took this photo today.   I have a lot of bumble bees just like this one. I also have bees with
yellow bars and no yellow.
I am no expert on bumblebees.  The literature says the rusty patch has a range which includes the eastern United States.
I am not saying that this is a rusty patch but it sure does resemble one. 

Another possible rusty patch..   This is state of Washington, so I think it is unlikely unless the range for rusty patch is far larger than Easter United States.  See below

May 15

Here I stuck some tillandsia in the bark of a tree. This tillandsia plant has two significant
characteristics

1.  It only uses a plant as a substrate. It gives nothing and takes nothing away from the
host plant.  It is not a parasite

2.  If tillandsia is left on the tree, the first freeze will kill it, so it can never be an invasive
species.

I will remove it shortly before the first freeze.  I am thinking it will increase in size. Just an experiment

May 14

Checked out the bee houses today.

Left side bamboo tubes have 24 tubes completely filled.
Right side bamboo tubes have 36 tubes completely filled.

I suspect there is a slight difference in temperature so that
the right side is very slightly cooler. ( so the left side faces west and
the front faces south.)

After 2 months of activity, there is not a single routed-wood tube filled.
While the routed tubes are recommended by many mason-bee authorities,
the bees simply avoid the routed-wood tubes.  I have seen bees hover
in front of routed-wood tubes, but they clearly reject the idea of using the
routed-wood.

Just below condo #2  is condo #1. Condo #1 uses paper tubes. No paper tubes
were used.  Also, the paper tubes were on the large side of the diameter.

As I have said in previous posts, I will be using smaller diameter dowels to
roll tubes for next year.

Today the temperatures were in the mid-50s and rain was on and off all day.

May 13

I would like to identify this bee. Obviously, it is a bumble bee, but what is the species?

The above photo from condo2 shows bamboo tubes on the right side of the condo are loaded with complete mason bee nests.  Notice the white paper straws.  No bee of any kind showed the straws were useful.

lk

 photo of condo #1, showing my hand made paper tubes. The bees looked over my work and decided my amateur craft was worthless.   Not a single bee thought these tubes were worth using as cocoon depository locations. NOT ONE

There continue to be some mason bee activity, however, nearly all the tubes are filled
and I only saw one bee flying around the bee condo #2.

I broke up some of my recently acquired tillandsias and "planted" the sprigs on my
north fence. We will see if it increases in size over the next few weeks.

May 12 A video viewing the Condo #2 and then condo #1

I checked by bee houses.
Bee condo #1 was a total failure, not a single filled tube.
Condo #2   Had two types of cocoon tubes. The routed wood contained
nothing.  But the bamboo tubes contained about 80% of the tubes totally
filled.
According to some websites, I will need to wait until October to extract the
cocoons from the tubes.  So, I will wait.
I am not sure of the best place to keep the tubes until October.  I think I will
package them up in a cardboard box and tuck them away in a closet.

I plan to make paper tubes for next year.  I need to buy some dowels of various
sizes.  According to several websites, I will need to use parchment paper.  The failed
tubes are made out of computer printer paper. I don't know why but it sure did
fail. 

condo 2  left and middle areas

view of the routed wood block(notice   not a single bee chose to nest here)

May 8

There was some rain today,  so the mud bucket is helping the mason bees.

May 5 Cinco de Mayo

The bees do not seem to have any idea of holidays except for
3.14 (March 14 - Pi Day) 

They also seem to know about the Ides of March.  Even though today was Cinco de Mayo, the mason bees did not seem to care.

May 4

I'm thinking of branching out to studying air plants.  During months
between July and February, there really will be no mason bee activity.

May 3

As the bees fill tubes, they add about 10 cocoons
for each tube filled.
Not sure how yet, but I intend to empty all the tubes at
the end of the nesting cycle.  I intend to keep track of
a number of factors for each tube
1. length of tube
2. diameter of tube
3. number of cocoons in tube
4. position of tube (left side, center or right side) in the house
5. condo address  #1 or #2
6. type of tube (paper-liner, cardboard(no liner), bamboo, routed wood

The data should be very instructive .

Next year I intend to mount the houses on the south side of house
so that they can get direct sun from both south and east sun.
 

May 2

Nothing very exciting today

May 1

As far as I know mason bees have no significant issues with
May 1. 

 I think May 30 may be the end of the mason bee season.

What ever the day is, after May 15 I will watch the activity
closely.

 I would like to identify the last day of cocoon building.

April 30

Dry weather may mess up the mason bee cocoon building.

April 29

Cool (60º-70º F) , dry days ahead.
We will see how the bees do.

April27

April  27
A little rain, which is good for the wet clay bucket
Some activity
Look forward to collecting cocoons in a few weeks

April 23

No rain today
Bees should be busy
Close to 60ºF  degrees all day

April 22

Rain is off and on today.
This is especially good for the mud bucket.
By the mid to end of May the mason bees will be
done.

I've been studying the plant genus Tillandsai. It is very interesting.
It does not grow in soil.  It just hangs on another plant or can be suspended on a string.  It can be misted with water daily or simply
soaked for a few hours once a week.

April 21

Not much to report today.
Some rain.  On Saturday, Looks like rain early the coming week
That is good for my mason bee mud.

April 20

Was visiting a Walmart store today.  I was (not) amazed to
find an enormous white rabbit walking around in the store.
Two leg talent did the rabbit possess. I waved to it and it waved
back.

April 19

Watching an old Tales of Wells Fargo.
Two Cartridges and 21 Concealed Jumpers
Seems like the acting is good but the writing seems
a stretch.

My bees seem better organized than the writing of some of
the early episodes of TWF

April 18

Rain should be producing a good environment for the bees.
Plenty of mud and flowers.

I am getting some dowels of various diameters.  I plan to use 4, 5,
and 6 mm sizes.  (according to one person, some bees require 8 mm so I will add that size to my trial tubes)  I might even add a 10 mm cardboard tube with a parchment liner.

A good description of paper tube making can be found at
"half hill farm".  The author claims that parchment cooking paper
is the best solution for paper tubes.  I certainly plan to try that!
Credit goes to Randy Person.

april 17

Now we will have to wait until mid May to see the total results.
After the end of May, the bees should all be cocooned.  We will
see how it goes.

April 10

Working on next years bee tubes.

This time I am using dowels with 5, 6 and 7 mm diameters
to roll the paper tubes. Some tubes will be brown paper tubes
and some will be white.  I have parchment paper, so I will also
try to use it.

I could buy ready-made tubes but I like the idea of testing various
papers and sizes.  I will definitely make all the tubes 6 inches long.
My bamboo tubes in condo-2 are 6 inches long and the bees seem
to like those for nests.

April 6 Rainy day, hard to even inspect things

rain rain
no activity
The clay gets fresh rainwater, so that is a plus.
Went to dinner and a show. While the show was very
entertaining the dinner was totally awesome.

April 3

16 tubes filled
Hope the bees get to work

April 2, day after April fools' day Ma Kettle gets a name

By 3pm  condo-2 remains at 14 filled bee cocoon tubes.

Interestingly, one bee tube is nearly 1/2 in diameter. The bee has been working on it furiously for at least a week.  I decided to name her Ma Kettle. She is noisy and really busy.  Actually, she is nearly finished with the tube.

There are another 4 bees which are also very busy. I am surprised their nests are as yet not filled. I notice that when they return to their nests they typically return as a group. While they are supposed to be a "solitary bee", they do seem to have some limited social behaviors.

April ...Fools'... Day

I will update the blog at about noon or so

At noontime, I noticed no new filled tubes.

I did have one bamboo tube which was filled last summer.
I kept it refrigerated until now. I put it out today.
I am worried that the humidity was not properly controlled but we will see if any bees emerge.

Last fall I did not take care to humidify the refrigerated cocoon tube. My mistake.  Hopefully, it worked anyway.
================
3:00 pm
Condo-2 now has 12 filled nests.  It appears that bees are utilizing all unfilled tubes so within a week or so I expect all the tubes to be filled.  We have so many bees that when I stand in front of the condo-2 and watch the action, I typically see 3 bees entering tubes within a minute.   Some of the tubes have been filled so far that I can frequently see the bee working in a tube (head in or head out).

As I said several days ago, one of the tubes on the left side is close to a half inch
in diameter. I observed a bee who is very busy on the half inch hole.  Considering the total cubic volume, there should be a large number of cocoons when the bee is finished.

The condo-2 with the bamboo is by far the most active. Paper tubes have very little action. Routed out bee trays have very little action.

Finally, at 6pm There are 14 filled nests.
I wonder what the count will be at 6pm tomorrow?
Considering increases over the past few days, 
the number ought to be 16 or 17   we will see

Today this blog exceeded 1,000 views for the first time.
Not a big deal (actually a very small deal)but it is a milestone.

March 31, 2019 Mason Bee update

March 31

I checked the condos today at noon.
No new filled bamboo tubes.
However, lots of activity in Condo-2.
I notice some bees will go in head first and then come out of the tube
and back into the tube. Seems to me they are going to lay an egg when they
back in.

I have noticed the bee who uses the huge diameter hole, does so repeatedly.
She does not seem to be larger than the other bees but maybe she is simply
able to lay more eggs in such a large tube since each egg will take up less length.

Condo-1 continues to be extremely low activity.
As of 6:30 pm the completed cocoon tube count is at 11.  in condo-2

It seems like there is a difference in color for several clay types in Condo-2.
A few are the same light color as the clay I mixed up.  Most are dark brown clay.

March 30 Mason bee update

March 30  Optimism is the word of the day.  I like to see more and more bamboo tubes filling up with clay.   It appears that the clay being used by the mason bees is the same
as the little pot of clay, I provided.

I checked the bees this morning. Nothing new. One bee was hanging out on the
condo-2.  Not much activity.  Count of filled tubes still stands a 6.
6 was this morning
=====================================================
Now at 6:45 pm the count stands at 8 and a half.  The half-tube will probably be filled in a day or two.

If the typical cocoon tube contains 10 cocoons, then we are talking 80 plus bees for
next year.  I hope this represents only half because there remain up to four weeks left in the season.  We will see.

Judging by the activity, I should see several more filled tubes in a few days.

For sure next year condo-2 will be relocated to the south side of the house with
an eastern morning exposure.  The western wall gets absolutely no morning sun.

March 29, 2019 Mason Bee update

March 29

I just checked the bees.  Condo-2 has 6 filled bamboo tubes. Several other tubes have shown activity so I expect several other tubes to be filled in a few days.

Condo-1 has yet to display much activity.  I know my  paper diy tubes are simply too large in diameter,  I would say the diameters are 8 or 9 mm. Just too big.

The position of condo-2 is basically on the west side of the building.  The position of
condo-1 is on the southwest corner.   According to many sources, the condos should
be on a northeast corner of a building with full morning sun.

I was at a grocery store today. I purchased some paper straws. I will be installing them in vacant spaces, I hope they will attract some bees.

March 28 Mason bee update

Good activity on condo-2 today. The temperature was low to mid-60ºs. F

While only 3 bamboo tubes are filled, many bees are busy filling several tubes.  One weird mason-bee flew into a huge tube hole and stayed there. I think the tube is close to a half inch in diameter.

Then, I saw a few bees squeeze themselves into 5 mm holes.   I saw one bee back into her nest hole.  Most bees go in head first.  On the other hand, when the holes are viewed at night with a flashlight, I always see their heads.

I still see little or no activity on condo-1. The homemade tubes do not seem to attract any mason bees.  Maybe by the end of May, I will see some use.  Next spring the tubes in condo-1 will be better-crafted tubes.  I will make them much smaller.

I think a better way to use routed out wooden trays would be to make them then insert custom made paper tubes.

I wonder if anyone has ever done a study which offers a reason why mason bees approach the nest in a very erratic fashion. Another behavior which is interesting is that often a bee will approach the nest then do a power climb. Frequently they climb 30 feet straight up. Amazing.

March 27 installed a few "compostable" white straws

March 27
Just as a test, I installed a few "compostable" white straws

The straws seem like their made out of  plastic, but the package said the material was not plastic. Supposed to be made from compostable plant material.  I am not at all sure these straws are any good.

On the left side of condo-2, one of the bamboo tubes has been completely filled.
So as of this morning, there are two filled tubes.  There are a few bees working on
other tubes.  I am looking forward to completed holes in the removable wooden trays.
So far I have only seen activity on one hole in the removable wooden trays.
It looks like there is a third hole being used, but not nearly filled yet.
Moderate activity around condo-2 today. No activity around condo-1.

Temperatures in the mid-50s.

Put a plastic bottle filled with compostable straws on the fence today. The fence receives morning sun. It faces directly east🌞. Some people say the bee condo should face east. So  I put this up on the fence facing east. 

I went outdoors to check on the two condos after sundown.  It turns out that with the use of a flashlight I could see the faces of bees in 3 bamboo tubes. I checked the wooden trays.  I could see no bees in those holes.

It is 118 miles from Federal Way to the Canadian border.   So the activity of the mason bees here, should not be much different from Canada.

March 26 mason bee update (reaction to a bar magnet)

No new breaks. Of the 8 tubes, 6 have had bees emerge.
Condo-2  continues to be quite active.  Today a bee was quite busy
packing a bamboo tube on the left side of the condo.
No activity on condo-1.

I tried a little "experiment".  I took a magnet and set it on the sill at the
bottom of condo-2.  I was amazed to see a mason-bee hover with great excitement
in front of the bar magnet.  Very interesting observation.  I intend to investigate
this activity.
I need to take a video of this behavior.  Maybe some enterprising grad student has
done a thesis on this behavior.  It makes sense that bees use magnetic environmental
cues to fly.  I see studies regarding honey bees have been recorded.

I can say the mason bee's reaction to a magnet was amazing.
I bought some paper straws today. I have several spaces in the bee condos. I intend
to install them within the next few days.