Native Bees Find Winter Shelter in Surprising Places

As the buzz of busy bees gave way to the rustle of fallen leaves in my autumn garden, the last of the bumblebee stragglers hit up fading mountain mint blooms. Day by day, fewer sparkly green sweat bees and dwarf carpenter bees nectared on the asters, eventually vanishing along with the fluffy field thistle seeds.

- Nancy Lawson

Despite appearances, the bees never really left us. While we snuggle under blankets indoors, bees of many shapes and sizes hide under leafy covers of their own. Seventy percent of the nearly 4,000 native bee species in North America build nests on or below the surface, and many of their progeny spend winter ensconced in soil, emerging as adult bees just in time to catch favorite blooms. The rest are cavity nesters, spending winter in logs, broken wildflower stalks and twigs of shrubs like elderberry and roses.

IT’S NOT ABOUT HIVES; IT’S ABOUT HABITAT