Why Solitary Bees Deserve a Place in Your Garden

When most of us picture a bee, we imagine a buzzing hive and a queen surrounded by thousands of workers. In Britain, though, the vast majority of our roughly 270 bee species are solitary. The red mason bee, the leafcutter bee, and the hairy-footed flower bee all live alone, each female building her own nest and stocking it with pollen and nectar before sealing it up and flying off. They are gentler than honeybees, rarely sting, and they are superb pollinators — a single red mason bee can visit as many flowers in a day as several hundred honeybees working together.

What they lack is nesting space. Modern gardens are tidy places: borders cleared, dead stems cut back, old walls repointed. Those hollow plant stems and crumbling mortar joints were once their nurseries. A bee hotel is a small way to give that back, and it costs almost nothing if you build it from things you were going to throw away.

What Solitary Bees Actually Need

Different species look for different things, so a good hotel offers a few options.

• Hollow stems — bamboo canes, and the dried stalks of plants such as sedum, fennel, sunflower, buddleia, hogweed and teasel. Bees want tubes that are closed at one end, like a bamboo cane cut just below a node.
• Drilled wood blocks — a solid block of untreated timber with a grid of holes. This is the most durable option and will last for years.
• Holes between 4mm and 10mm — small species use narrow tubes, while red mason bees and leafcutters prefer 7–10mm.
• Depth of 100–150mm — shorter holes tend to produce more male bees, because the females are laid at the back.

Ignore the trendy designs filled with pine cones, bark and hollow plastic tubes. They either offer nothing useful or trap moisture and encourage mould. Simple and dry beats decorative every time.

Collecting Your Materials

A bee hotel is essentially a rainproof box with open ends facing the sun. Nearly all of it can be recycled.

• A container — an old tin can with the label removed, a length of drainpipe, an offcut of plastic guttering, or a sturdy wooden box made from pallet wood.
• A roof — a slate, a piece of roofing felt, a plastic tray, or a section of an old bucket lid, overhanging the front by several centimetres.
• Fillers — bamboo canes, spent perennial stems, and a drilled block of hardwood or untreated softwood.
• Fixings — galvanised wire, a couple of screws, or metal brackets for mounting.

If you are using timber, make sure it is untreated. Varnish, paint and pressure-treated wood give off fumes that can harm developing larvae. For the drilled block, aim for a piece at least 100mm deep and drill straight in, not all the way through. Sand the entrance holes lightly — a splintered rim tears delicate wings.

Putting It Together

Cut your bamboo canes so each one ends just below a natural node, leaving the node as the closed back wall. Trim them to roughly the same length so the front sits flush. Push them into your container tightly; gaps let in draughts and predators, so pack them in and wedge any loose ones with a scrap of wood. If you are adding a drilled block, put it at the bottom or in the centre and surround it with stems.

Fix the roof above the opening so rain runs off the front, away from the tubes. A slight forward tilt is a good idea, as water then drains rather than seeping in. If you are using a tin can or a drainpipe, mount it horizontally with the open end facing out, and make sure the back is sealed.

Choosing the Right Spot

Placement matters more than most people realise.

• Full sun — a south or south-east facing wall or fence. Bees need warmth to become active in the morning.
• Shelter — out of prevailing wind and driving rain, ideally under wide eaves or an overhanging branch.
• Height — at least a metre off the ground, well out of the way of cats, foxes and slugs.
• Nearby flowers — bees will not travel far if they can avoid it. Fruit trees, herbs left to flower, and single-flowered dahlias and cosmos all help.

Avoid anywhere that gets soaked, and keep the hotel away from bird feeders and nest boxes. Tits and woodpeckers will happily pick larvae out of a bee hotel given the chance.

Looking After It Through the Year

Once occupied, a bee hotel needs very little from you. Leave it alone from spring through summer while the bees are working. Come autumn, the larvae are inside, spinning cocoons and waiting out the winter. Do not bring the hotel indoors — they need the cold to develop properly.

In late winter or early spring, before the new season's bees emerge, check the tubes for mould, damp or damage. Replace any clogged or rotting stems with fresh ones, and gently clear debris from the front. Wooden blocks can be scrubbed with a stiff brush; do not wash them. Over time, a well-sited hotel will be reused year after year, and you may find the drilled block taken over by entirely different species from the ones using the stems beside it.

Few garden projects give so much for so little. A few feet of bamboo, an old tin, and half an hour's work will shelter dozens of bees and pay you back in better pollination for years.