I was talking to my fairly new neighbour last Spring when he mentioned, he had seen a large swarm of Honey Bees on the wall of his house a couple of days earlier. Given he has a relatively new house, probably 30 years old, I suggested that they were more likely to end up finding a home on my much older house. My house is a part of an ex-barn that is well over 200 years old. A couple of days later, on a warm, sunny afternoon, they found the wall of my house. For an hour or so that afternoon, there were a few thousand Honey Bees around the wall above the kitchen. But fortunately most moved off after that. But clearly a small colony established itself that afternoon. Despite being only a few feet above the kitchen door, it has been a real pleasure having them there. They are happy to go off & pollinate a lot of the local flowers. The nest is even closer to my bedroom. I've found that there isn't a problem opening the windows, providing they are opened sufficiently so if any get confused, they can easily get out again. The colony remained active throughout the milder, sunnier days in the winter & has definitely picked up in the last fewer weeks now it's getting warmer.
Check tomorrow to see the next day's wildlife sighting at when I will be confined at #BWKM0.
The colony: The bonus of having an old wall with gaps where there should be (25 Mar 20)
Unfortunately, there seems to be a few that have ended up getting caught in the recent chilly conditions & once out of the sun, they perish. I've found a few cold Honey Bees, which I've moved back into the sun & some managed to revive.
Western Honey Bee: Sadly, this individual didn't recover, but at least it posed in the sun
Check tomorrow to see the next day's wildlife sighting at when I will be confined at #BWKM0.