Bee or wasp, good or bad??

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lucysmum
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Hi.
Over the last couple of days something has been making a home in the bottom of one of my pepper plants. They are in the greenhouse standing on a tray of grit. It has burrowed through the grit into a drainage hole of the plant pot. I'm not sure if its a small honeybee type bee or somekind of wasp. I've seen it carrying bits of leaves in there. Sometimes it seems very cross when I'm in there, buzzing me. I don't mind it so far, but don't want to open the door to a swarm one day.
I don't want to hurt it, if I move the pepper outside, do you think it would be able to find it again & carry on with its next making?

Not sure if this is the right place to put this question, maybe it should be in pests!
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glallotments
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I don't think it's likely to be a honey bee. It could be a soliaty bee of some sort - they tend to look for holes. If it is a common wasp it will be yellow and black striped very pronounced and a thinnish waist but I wouldn't expect it to be carrying bits of leaves.

Could it be a leaf cutter bee. Are there circular holes along the edges of any plants in your garden for instance roses?
There are lots of videos of this bee on YouTube http://www.youtube.com/ if you search for leafcutter bee.
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Galatea
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Hi there,

There are a large number of bee and wasp species, many of which are solitary and almost all of which are very beneficial in the garden for pollination & pest control.

If you move your pot to a very different location - i.e some distance away & outside - then your bee/wasp is unlikely to be be able to locate it again. It's generally believed that they construct landmark maps to help them find their way back and forth so it probably wouldn't recognise the pot if it was in different surroundings. You could try moving it in stages perhaps?
pongeroon
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By coincidence I was going to post a question about exactly the same thing. We came back from hols (France, hot, seaside, oysters, lovely) to find a bee thingy carrying a piece of lettuce into a pot with a pepper seedling in it. I didn't want to move it because I'm interested to see what happens.
lucysmum
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Thanks everyone. Its definately a leaf cutter bee. I quite like it now buzzing around the greenhouse. Don't know if its doing the pepper plant any good though as its dug loads of compost out the pot.
Only little worry is, its obvioulsy making a nest in there, so will it lay loads of eggs which will hatch & will I find a swarm in the green house later on!!
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Galatea
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lucysmum wrote:Only little worry is, its obvioulsy making a nest in there, so will it lay loads of eggs which will hatch & will I find a swarm in the green house later on!!


I've always been fond of leaf-cutters and I don't mind the little circles that they cut - The Amelanchiers seem to be their favourite - but we've never seen a nest that they've made, they seem to be very good at hiding them away.

They only lay around 30 to 40 eggs in a nest, not all of which will hatch out, and fewer still will survive to flight size, so I think you should be spared a swarm of bees in the greenhouse!
Nature's Babe
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Clever bee, I guess it figured the pot was the only place not likely to be hoed or dug. This is another reason I don't dig in the garden, and I see a lot of solitary bees, creeping into their little holes, we need all the bees we can save, as they are all in decline, and without them - no pollination. Even saw a bumble bee investigate a hole in the ground one day!
Sit down before a fact as a little child, be prepared to give up every preconcieved notion, follow humbly wherever and to whatever abyss nature leads, or you shall learn nothing.
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lucysmum
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I had 2 bees, both in pepper pots, but I haven't seen them fora couple of days now. Not sure if they've got fed up of their daily bath when I watered! I hope they haven't moved out.
pongeroon
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Likewise, Lucysmum. Not seen the bee since the first time. There seems to be some more compost spilled out of the drainage holes though, so I take that as a good sign. I've planted out all the other peppers, but I'm prepared to sacrifice one for the bees 8)
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