I’ve been away for most of the month. Before we went we realised bees had taken up residence in No. 2 Sparrow Row (no.1, 3-5 are already occupied and very chirpy). Right outside my garage / studio door and buzzing in the hole whenever it was hot, fanning the inside of the box with their wings.
Come back to find Loo Box (we have an outside loo (fully tiled 
in a brick built shed), is also full of bees.
My garden is buzzing - and the sparrows are looking anxious as they roost in all the boxes in winter,
Was wondering whether I should contact a bee-keeper to see what I should do with them ?
I also have an insect house - Christmas present. Not the rustic thing I was thinking off but a des. res painted. shiny cream
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@JOYSofGLASS If they are causing you problems then yes it is probably worth contacting your local bee keeping association to see if they can help you rehome them. However I’m wondering if they are one of the social bumblebee types (?carder bee?) which never achieve the same colony size as the honey bees and the bee keepers would have little interest in so if it is only the sparrows that are being put out maybe invest in some additional sparrow housing instead and tell them to man (?bird?) up and get some lessons from a bee eater (which are seriously colourful but alas not resident in this country).
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Can’t quite see the backsides, but I’m pretty sure that’s the Tree Bumblebee I said about further up. Seems quite common that they nest in bird boxes.
There’s some advice here about moving the nest, if you want to
https://bumblebeeconservation.org/about-bees/faqs/moving-bumblebee-nests/
But then there’s some other info from the British Pest Control Association on Tree Bees nests which says ‘Some traits of tree bees can be a cause of concern, but there is nothing to worry about. Commonly they establish a nest in bird boxes, or in parts of buildings, and may cause concern through apparent high level of nest flight activity due to ‘nest surveillance’ by drones, and the sound of bee chatter/activity heard through the ceiling are all signs of activity.’
So if it’s not bothering you, I’d leave it where it is 
Thanks and to @SashaGarrett. no they’re not a problem and I love to have them buzzing all over my flowers.
Just wondering really what happens in winter - I’ll have a Google when it gets round to that.
My garden is entirely wild life friendly. Just want frogs and newts in the pond and I’ll be a happy bunny. (had one of those last month as well).
Delighted to see the hedgehog strolling across the lawn yesterday checking if I had put any mealieworms out - even though it was my first night back.
Of course I had (I provide a potful when I’m away for my neighbour to feed it/ them but suspect his chicken might be getting the lion’s share.)
I’m afraid frogs and newts don’t share ponds very well - frog tadpoles will eat newt spawn and vice versa so which ever turns up first and plants its metaphorical flag wins your pond, the others might visit but they won’t sucessfully breed. Dragonfly nymphs will eat both frog and newt tadpoles but such is the circle of life and dragonflies are very pretty. My parents solved the issue by having 3 ponds but they have a lot of space!
Fingers crossed your amphibians turn up soon.
It’ll probably be the same with Tree Bees as the other bumblebees in that it’s only the queen that hibernates and that’s why you see the massive bumblebees first in Spring because they are the queens looking for a new nest. Not sure where they hibernate though. I think the queen in your nest box will lay eggs that will become new queens and they leave to set up new colonies away from that nest, and that nest dies. This is all coming from a vague recollection of a wildlife programme on the life cycle of bees. Fascinating stuff though
If you’ve got fish in your pond, the frogs might not do so well. Fish love to eat frog spawn and tadpoles. On the other hand though, if you’ve got fish in your pond you might get toads instead. That’s what’s happened to me with my mini pond with one fish in it. I’ve got about 200 toadpoles in it. Turns out toads love ponds with fish in because the fish clear out all the frogspawn, but won’t touch the toadspawn or the toadpoles because they are toxic to them, so it leaves all the tadpole food for the toadpoles. More fascinating stuff
I have got hundreds of frogs in my pond and garden - occasionally find them in the house too! Whenever I mow the lawn it comes alive with frogs hopping around trying to escape the lawn mower - hopefully most of them do. Surprisingly we have some newts too.
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We have in the past had hundreds of baby frogs on the path outside the door.
Not sure if from the pond across the road or if they’ve come from a water barrel next door.
Our fish pond is up a couple of steps and raised up so I’ve created “frog’s leap” out of some logs of wood so frogs or toads can climb up into the water (ever the optimist) but none so far.
We had a well stocked pond at our last house, fish and frogs / toads and yes there were newts too as we discovered when we had to empty in when we got a leak. The newts spent the night in our bath !
Jo Sarah - It is amazing what you can learn from folksy! Thanks for sharing that link, I enjoyed reading about the tree bees x
No worries, Diane. I only found out about them when my mum told me about these scary swarming bees she had in her garden in an old bird box, so I looked them up and it turns out they’re harmless and actually quite good to have around 
When we moved into our house, I found a newt in my garden but there wasn’t a pond so I decided to make one. Now I have lots of newts and see the occasional Toad & Frog but never get Frogspawn, I have been told that the frogs will not breed in my pond as Newts eat Frogspawn. A couple of years ago I put up some wooden ‘Bee Hotels’ and I absolutely love watching the Leaf Cutter Bees flying backwards & forwards from the Jasmine plants where they cut little round pieces of leaf. I put a video of the Leaf Cutter Bees on my Facebook page a couple of days ago if anyone wants to have a look. x
https://www.facebook.com/angelawarwickjewellery.co.uk/
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