About the Project

My friends at LifeCycles started this project in May 2000 and quickly began making a difference in my bee community. They started by building 100 bee condos that are absolutely perfect for blue orchard bee mothers to lay their eggs in. Once mounted, these bee boxes provide enough space for 15,000 new bees to hatch every year. My mom was very excited to find one of these boxes in a backyard garden because she was having a hard time finding clean, round holes for her eggs to grow in.

To attract a family of bees to your yard, you also need bright, beautiful flowers in your garden. I especially like to see native flowers that are single-blossom, purple, blue, or yellow. Some of these include echinacea, borage, calendula, and sunflower.

To help encourage people to grow a diversity of native flowers, LifeCycles distributed 400 packages of flower seeds that are sure to attract native bees. Now I am seeing these lovely blossoms in gardens all around the city. Ever since the bee condos and seed packs were added to local gardens, I have seen more blue orchards buzzing around than ever before!

This project has also used education as a tool for spreading the message about the native bees in our area. LifeCycles has written and distributed a series of fact sheets that discuss growing bee gardens, the effects of pesticides, building bee condos, and the importance of pollination. One thing that they have discovered is that...

Everyone loves learning about bees!