As long as a four-person table
I've never seen a native bee hive before, let alone one this big! At first I thought it was a piece of bark which blew off the eucalyptus tree in the backyard. I ignored it for several days, before taking a closer inspection. Had I been there on the day I noticed it fall from the tree, I wonder if I could've tasted Sugarbag? That is what it has been coined by Indigenous Australians, instead of 'honey'.
Millions of cells created by an army of stingless bees
The good news is, when I did see this wonderful sight several days after it had fallen, the native bees were back at the tree, the old hive had fallen from. So I assume a queen had survived, or they would have flown away. The acacias are in full bloom now, so they should be able to restock.
Even if I haven't seen as many European honey bees around, I'm happy to know there's still a stronghold of native bees in my backyard.
I did a little research on our native stingless bees, and found while they're harmless to humans, you wouldn't want to be an African Hive Beetle - because that's a whole other story.
UPDATE: Mystery solved in 2016, when we had two trees cut down. The professional loppers we hired, found it was paper wasps (ouch) not native bees, in that particular tree.
thats a very nice hive Chris, nature provides some wonderful art work. what will you do with it?
ReplyDeleteWe were thinking of contacting Sarah's school, to see if they wanted an example for nature appreciation, or some other relevant topic. But I suspect if we did that, we wouldn't get to see it in one piece again, lol.
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