[Morgan Dunn]: Show you guys how to dissect a blue orchard bee nest.
Um, really, we really like to use these cardboard tubes with paper straw inserts.
And I have a, a nest here from last year.
So they're cocooned adults.
You wanna do this in the late fall or winter, probably September or later.
Um, when they're fully developed adults
and you don't have the chance of destroying some of their, their nest
or their offspring.
Um, we like to plug the back of our nest with, um, with a little plug.
You can use a cork or just about anything.
And that keeps the light from coming into the nest,
and also prevents any bees from fallnig out the backside.
So you can just pull out that.. back plug.
Sometimes the straw comes with it, sometimes it doesn't.
Um, we have these nice straw pullers,
but uh, a thin pair of pliers would probably work just fine.
So here we have the front of the nest that's the blocked off with a, a mud wall.
So we're gonna start here, and males are, are typically laid towards the front.
So I'll expect to see some male cocoons at the beginning.
They usually, a little bit smaller.
Um, and a little bit different shaped.
So here you can see a male cocoon.
And then you can just keep on pulling the straw,
twisting it open.. to get all these cocoons out.
And they are adults right now so you don't have to worry about crushing them,
um, they're pretty sturdy and pretty resilient.
[Sound of paper tearing]
And you just wanna make sure you get all the last cocoons
'cause as females typically are towards the back.
Can see this is an example of a female cocoon.
It's quite a bit larger than these male ones,
and it seems like this straw has, has a lot of males,
and, and maybe just one female.
So I'm gonna show you how to open up one of these reeds.
Um, there's nothing actually in here
'cause we pre- we prefer to use these, uh, cardboard tubes with the paper inserts.
Um, but this is bamboo so you can collect these yourself,
um and they do have these nodes where they form these natural walls on the back.
So you'd want to- to cut this about six inches, um, long
and have that natural wall towards the back of the nest.
Um, so you can just use a, a razor blade or a knife,
um to kind of get into one of these, these cracks.
Kind of split open.. the reed.
And there's usually a, a gap here
where the, the offspring aren't all the way towards the end of the nest
so, so you can have some room to work with.
Um, but once you start getting towards the in-inside of this nest,
um you wanna be really careful to not, to not harm any of those cocoons.
So just split it open kind of tear it apart
and all of your cocoons will, will be inside.
So this is another style of nesting material.
These are called waferboards, or um, laminates.
Um, and you can use paper straw inserts with these or not.
Um, but it does make dissection a little bit easier.
Um, 'cause these, these boards actually pull apart.
And so then you can have your, your paper insert to peel that open
or just use a tool if you're not using paper inserts.
Then these cocoons will be just be right in these grooves.
And so you can kinda just peel off the cocoons really easily.
So I'm gonna open up this straw and show you what a pollen ball looks like,
so that's the provision that they make, um, to lay an egg on.
But sometimes the larva doesn't take and the egg dies,
so you may open up a straw and just find these uneaten pollen balls.
So that's a sign that the egg died for some reason or the larva died.
Um, there's a cocoon right there.
So that's another reason to dissect your nest to see what you have,
you might have some sort of viruses, um or problem
that's, that's killing these orchard bees when they're very young.
Um, so these are all nests that were incomplete
and the, the offspring never developed.
[Sound of bees buzzing]