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Gnasher
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Location: East Midlands, UK
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23-05-2014, 11:27 PM
Originally Posted by Florence View Post
Could you get a keyhole imitation and hang it up next to the door so the bee could lay her eggs there?

I don't know anything about masonry bees but they sound interesting. I shall go google for some info

Not bees but I've lived many times with wasps. When we were little kids my mum had a holiday cottage in the Bernese Mountains, at the top of the house and right underneath the roof we had a huge hornets nest. They were always buzzing around us in summer. My mum just told us to be careful not to squash them accidentally, and none of us ever got stung.

About 10 years ago we had a wasps nest in our attic. First it was the size of a fist and over the summer it grew. Funny thing was that down in the garden we had these wicker garden chairs that were so weathered they were grey. We could see the wasps gnawing at them and getting little shavings off, and the wasps nest was the exact same colour!

In winter they obviously all died, and we took the nest down (as my mum was going to sell the house).

I once encountered a bee swarm on the road I lived on! That was quite impressive.
Threat.
Your mum sounds lovely! Wasps and hornets all have their place in nature and fit left in peace will pose no threat. We used to have wasp nests in the garden when my daughter was small and we just told her not to poke around the nest and she would be fine, so she didn't and she was. Each to his own.
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Rosebud77
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Location: The Kingdom, Ireland
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24-05-2014, 06:14 AM
Originally Posted by Tang View Post
I could never resort to pellets or poison to deal with my slug and snail problems because I had a giant tortoise for more than 30 years. Would have poisoned her too.

I used salt but oh YUKKK the mess that leaves - the slime is almost impossible to remove.

Beer bottles with just a little beer left in them, placed lying on their sides in the beds was effective in that they were FULL of slugs the next day. However I could never make my mind up if the beer was BRINGING THEM IN to start with, not just luring those already there!

And it was a hell of a job to convince my two lads to LEAVE A LITTLE BEER IN THE BOTTOM of their bottles!

no need for beer; anything sweet or fruity works. i put out empty cat food tins half full of diluted juice etc. they climb in and that is it.
even chopped up lettuce in water.

trouble here is that rain is heavy so they overfill..this year the pellets are needed. salt poisons the earth and i need to grow food here.

slugs are great climbers. i once left a few new picked potatoes on a tall hall stand. the next morning they were well chewed. slugs had crawled under the door and they climbed up. slime everywhere,, as a child i remember grease bands being put round the trunks of apple trees to stop them getting to the fruit.
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Rosebud77
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Location: The Kingdom, Ireland
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24-05-2014, 06:20 AM
Originally Posted by Gnasher View Post
Threat.
Your mum sounds lovely! Wasps and hornets all have their place in nature and fit left in peace will pose no threat. We used to have wasp nests in the garden when my daughter was small and we just told her not to poke around the nest and she would be fine, so she didn't and she was. Each to his own.

i feed the wasps in late summer. they come to the market stall after any trace of jam on the jars and scare folk.

special offer, i say, a free wasp with every jar of jam!

so i keep a jar or three of sweet water away from the stall; they are starving

same here; jars full of food well away from the house; attracts flies too.
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twix
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24-05-2014, 06:46 AM
In previous years our house has been a magnet for wasps and you could hear them chewing away behind the wall in the back bedroom. They HAD to go! Now this year there are bees trying to get into every nook and cranny. I blocked up one big hole where a pipe used to come out with silver foil. That worked but they've gone to the other side of the house. As long as the dogs don't interfere with them they are welcome to stay.
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Florence
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24-05-2014, 10:29 AM
We might have a wasp nest under the roof of the kitchen extention now. I've seen one fly up there, so I'll keep an eye on it, but I don't mind them.

Coincidentially, after googleing Masonry Bees, I found a dead one on the stairs
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Gnasher
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24-05-2014, 10:43 AM
My mother had 2 lots of bees in her house - one up the top of a disused and chimney and the other in the ceiling of one of the bedrooms in a disused part of the house. Both colonies lived quite happily until one day mum went into the pantry and there was a load of brown sticky liquid seeping through the ceiling and onto the floor. It was honey that had poured down the chimney and seeped through the floorboards and down through to the pantry ceiling! Shame we couldn't use the honey. The bees have gone now but there must still be loads of honey up that chimney!
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