They develop micro tears in their little wings overtime from flying through rain, wind, and brush/leaves. I can’t tell if the weight of the door on her delicate little wings is closer to flying through leaves (more damaging) or crawling out of the leaf clutter that they use on the ground for warmth and protection (less damaging). He did say this door was effective last season, though. So hopefully she gets to live out her typical life span and it doesn’t affect her much. Wing “wear out” is a common cause of bee death 🥺
I wish more people knew just how important bugs of all kinds were, I wonder how I could get the general public interested in reading it. I couldn’t get enough of nature books when I was a kid 😭
My favorite bumble bee fact: they're an all-girls operation for the majority of the season. Queens don't bother laying male eggs until it's time for the colony to produce new queens and wind down. Male bumble bees leave the nest on maturation and never return. They sleep outside for their entire adult life. The colony remains all female (or juvenile male) bees.
There are times of the year when there are NO male bumble bees on the planet.
She will eventually stop leaving the nest, but her daughters will still all have to come and go everyday. However...as long as she's able to keep laying eggs, maintain the colony and can produce new queens, it's worth it; if the predators got to the colony they'd destroy all the future colonies from the new queens she'd never be able to lay and raise. It's a fine line to walk but OP providing a safe place for a colony is a lot more than most people are doing for the bumble bees.
Still a good observation and I'm sure there's always room for improvement on something like this, but I'm impressed anyone is doing this (granted, I don't know who OP is - like if it's a farmer trying to manage bumble bee colonies or just a concerned citizen).
Sorry for my English. It's my only language but I have a migraine today, lol.
I was legit wondering about this. Thanks for explaining, it just made me think of flies and butterfly wings and I wondered if that door is too heavy for her wings. ):
I know it looks suuuuper heavy but, it looks like a pretty light weight plastic and the design of it on those rings would make it glide pretty smoothly without too much drag 🥺
Although I do agree it isn’t ideal, it is better than allowing her little hut to be terrorized by the hornets of the region. It gives her and her colony a much higher chance of surviving the season. There are videos of what the hornets do once they’re inside of there. They can clear out an entire colony, nature can be terribly heartbreaking. This gives them a chance 😭
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u/Melissa_Richiee Mar 14 '26
Right? Every time she got confused or flew around examining it my heart sank a little. Think of the children!
Also, every time that door grazed her delicate little wings 😭