THE BEES
It’s no secret: we love bees. So where does that love come from? The Watts family has been raising solitary bees for more than 50 years, selling leafcutter bees and mason bees to farmers to pollinate their crops. When Evan Watts founded Watts Brewing Company, he chose the bee as its emblem to pay homage to that family history.
Solitary Bees
Did you know that not all bees make honey? In fact, 90% of bee species are what are called “solitary bees”, meaning they don’t have a hive, don’t make honey, and may not even have stingers. Each individual female bee makes her own nest (typically in a hole in wood), lays her eggs, and dies at the end of the season. The eggs hatch the next year, and the annual cycle repeats. Solitary bees are often better pollinators than honeybees because they visit the flower specifically to collect pollen, and thus transfer more if it from flower to flower. Watts Solitary Bees raises two types of bees: leafcutter bees (Megachile rotundata) and mason bees (Osmia lignaria). You can learn more about them on the Rent Mason Bees website:
the Watts family
Roger Watts started raising leafcutter bees (Megachile rotundata) over 50 years ago in eastern Oregon. At the time, bees were much more widespread, so there were lots of leafcutters in the wild, and people often put out boards with perfectly sized holes to nest in so the bees wouldn't find holes in their house. Roger met farmers (especially alfalfa seed growers) who needed bees to maximize their pollination and started raising additional bees to sell to them. As a junior high science teacher, he could teach school during the school year and raise bees during the summer.
In the 70's, there was a major chalkbrood outbreak (Ascosphaera aggregata, a fungus that infects bee nests) that wiped out a significant percentage of the wild leafcutter bees in the American west. It also made it very difficult to raise healthy leafcutter bees in the quantities needed for pollination. The problems caused by chalkbrood forced much of Roger’s competitors out of business, but he found a method for raising healthy bees, and this method allowed his nascent business to flourish.
Jim Watts, Roger’s son and Evan’s father, grew up helping with the bees and ended up taking over the business in 2010. Around that time, colony collapse disorder hit the news, so he began looking into other bees to help address some of the crops that honeybees have historically pollinated. Mason bees, specifically the blue orchard bees (Osmia lignaria) native to the Pacific Northwest, are effective pollinators for many orchard crops like apples, pears and cherries, and have a lifecycle similar to leafcutter bees. It was a perfect fit, so Jim soon began raising mason bees as well. Agriculture is slow to adopt new innovations, so the transition to mason bees has been gradual. However in the last 5 years, the use of mason bees in orchards has started to hit the mainstream, with many forward-thinking growers using mason bees as a primary pollination vector.
Today, Watts Solitary Bees raises leafcutter bees in eastern Oregon, and mason bees here in western Washington (based in Bothell), with the majority sold to farmers. They are the largest suppliers of solitary bees in the US, and also produce bee nesting materials and provide pollination consulting for their farming partners. When he’s not out transforming our nation’s food chain, you’ll often find Jim Watts around the taproom checking in on Evan, fixing a broken door, or “inspecting” the beer.
Leafcutter Bees
Alfalfa leafcutter bees (Megachile rotundata) are a species of solitary bee that can be found all over the world. They are called leafcutter bees because they cut snippets out of leaves which they carry back to line their nest with. Their primary food source is not honey—as they don’t produce any—but the pollen they collect from flowers.
Leafcutters are effective pollinators for alfalfa (Medicago sativa), and are one of alfalfa seed farmers’ primary tools for ensuring maximum pollination. Alfalfa is one of the most important forage crops in the world, but a difficult crop to pollinate because of the structure of the flower. When a bee lands on the flower, a special petal trips the stamen which slaps the bee and showers it in pollen. Honeybees hate this and learn to avoid the special petal, and thus avoid pollinating the flower, but leafcutter bees don’t mind and scoop up the pollen to fly back to their nest.
Leafcutter bees are active from June through August and will work many types of flowers in your garden, including berries and vegetables.
Mason Bees
Blue orchard bees (Osmia lignaria) are the species of mason bee native to the Pacific Northwest. Like leafcutter bees, they are solitary bees, however they line their nests with mud instead of leaves. They get their name from the blue or greenish sheen of their abdomens as well as their proclivity towards orchards.
Mason bees are used for a variety of orchard crops including apples, pears, and cherries in the PNW, as well as the massive almond orchards in California. The almond bloom in the Central Valley of California is the biggest pollination event anywhere in the world, with over a million acres of orchards blooming at once. With honey bees struggling, blue orchard bees have stepped in to provide pollination.
Mason bees work in the cooler weather of a PNW spring. They are active from March through May, and frequent spring blooms like blueberry, cherries, and other fruit.
How you can support the Bees
Want to support the bees? You can raise bees at home too! We also offer smaller quantities of mason and leafcutter bees for home gardens through Rent Mason Bees. This rental program provides bee cocoons, along with all the nesting materials they need to build a thriving population. Rent Mason Bees does a rental program because solitary bees are susceptible to a range of predators and parasites including the chalkbrood mentioned above. The bees require careful protection over the winter, or you may end up promoting the bees' predators. Just order online and bees will be delivered in early spring, then ship everything back at the end of the season, and the Rent Mason Bees crew will clean and store the bees over the winter so they're healthy for next year. Click the link below to sign up!