Simple Bee Houses + Activities

Bee houses are a great project for any science class learning about bugs, bees, plants and lifecycles. They are super easy to make and provide a wealth of other projects and learning opportunities for students of all ages. This instructable will outline how our afterschool program made bee houses, as well as things to consider when choosing your materials and additional projects and resources that could be used along with the bee houses.

• Clean cans
• A primer paint (we used spray paint)
• Weather proof acrylics or sharpie markers
• Straws of varying materials
• Small twigs
• String or twine
• Hot glue
• Scissors

The bee houses we made are very simple, made of everyday items but could be modified to be a little more heavy duty and support more bees, this is what we used...

For the base we used fruit, veggie and soup cans ranging from 10-29oz. When picking your cans please remember it takes A LOT of straws to fill those bigger cans. We found the 10 or 15oz. worked best as our kiddos didn't lose interest in filling them. To make your bee houses a little sturdier, or for older kids you could use PVC pipe with an end cap sealing one end or make little wooden boxes.

For the inside, this time we used paper straws, twigs, rolled paper, and biodegradable straws. In the past I've used a variety of plastic, bamboo, cardboard and paper straws, as well as rolled paper, twigs, hollowed plant stems and wooden bits. The different materials will give your pollinators a variety of tube sizes and materials to choose which they want to build on. Providing a variety your first year can be good, as it will let you see which materials your pollinators prefer. If only a couple types of tube a re getting used you can fill your house with more of those types the following year. Ideally you will want tubes with a couple different diameters to accommodate different pollinators.

A note on materials I did not use this time:

ANY time you are using wood/lumber, make sure it is not treated!! The chemicals used to treat woods can be very harmful to pollinators!

When using thicker materials, you may want to cut them down in advance to fit inside your housing base. We opted for mostly straws this time so we would only have to cut the twigs for our kids. (Safety scissors will cut through paper straws but students may need to buddy up so they aren't shooting straw bits across the room)

Bamboo- Bamboo is great, it is natural and is never the same size or shape but it does not dry quickly if it gets wet. When using bamboo make sure, either your climate is dry or your bee house is well protected from rain.

Hollowed plant stems- Sunflowers, aster, raspberry, reeds and honeysuckle are all great hollow plants to use. They can be easily collected in the fall as everything is drying out and you don't have to mess with drying them yourself.

Wooden Bits- You will need a drill for these, use wither thicker dowels or little blocks. Drill holes into the blocks between 1/16th and 1/2 of an inch and wedge into your bee house to be surrounded by straws and other materials.

This is super simple, collect as many clean cans as bee houses you will be making. Make sure they are rinsed clean and remove their labels.

IF you want to decorate them, take your cans outside, line them up face down and spray paint (or otherwise prime) them.

Have kids use permanent marker or paint to decorate their cans.

Let dry.

At this point you may want to use a clear sealant on them (we did not do this this time). Again, place face down and seal.

Alternatively just use the plain silver soup cans!

Ideally you want all your inside pieces short than your can so they do not catch water when hung. If you have wide enough eves or another dry place, don't worry about this too much.

Give students a variety of options for inside their houses and have them fill their bee houses until they are packed tight enough that they can hold them upside down and nothing falls out. It helps to hold the cans at an angle as you fill them so that your insides lay flat.

If you are using twigs or hollow plants this can be a wonderful field trip opportunity, especially if your school is within walking distance of a nature area. Take some time to learn how to identify the plants that you want and have kids gather those as well as thin sticks and twigs to use.

We used some hot glue and twine to prep our bee houses for their new homes. Each bee house will need two loops of twine, one a little longer than the other. The shorter being about enough to wrap around two cans held together.

Hot glue your twine to the bottom of your cans, about 1/4 of the can height from the top and bottom, attaching the shorter length closer to the bottom and the longer closer to the open end. This will let your bee house hang at an angle so water will run off it and not into.

When deciding where to put your bee house look for a place out of the wind and away from bird houses. Ideally tie your bee house directly to something to minimize movement in the wind, moving bee houses make if hard for bees to land in them.

Alternatively nestle your bee house into a tree, in a dry covered place on the ground or with some thin wire.

The aforementioned plant ID field trip, I recommend finding a state or county park near you that has plenty of prairie land or is noted as having pollinator areas.

Play pollinator bingo, or just use to ID your visiting pollinators.

https://docs.google.com/document/d/1aI6kK22FKQ3TXB...

Take some time to learn about the benefits of pollinators and how different bugs and pollinators help plants grow. This is a great opportunity to visit a community/school garden and look for pollinators or put your bee houses. If your school does not already have a garden this would be a great opportunity to research the benefits of pollinators and to start a butterfly/pollinator garden. The links below are great resources to begin learning about WI bees and butterflies across the country.

https://hort.extension.wisc.edu/files/2016/08/WI-B... -Bee resource

https://www.naba.org/ -Butterfly resource

Plant some flowers to grow near your bee houses to help your pollinators a little more. Talk about the similarities of plants that pollinators like and how pollinators and flowers are mutually beneficent. WI Pollinators has a wonderful page on pollinator friendly plants with awesome details of when and where to plant them.

https://wisconsinpollinators.com/Garden/G_Butterfl...

Consider having students research some different beneficial bugs native to your area and where they live (tubes, leaves, grass, etc) and have students make houses for them in the same manor as the bee houses. The following link is a great resource to start learning about Wisconsin's pollinators.

https://wisconsinpollinators.com/default.aspx

**Please note I live in Wisconsin, most of the mentioned species will be more localized to the Midwest/WI**