Masonry bees coming down chimney flue

[daisychain237]

Does anyone know how I can stop this?

I have two unused chimney's and have noticed masonry bees coming down from one of these the past few weeks. I know they are popular this time of the year, and will probably vacate in a few months (?)

At the moment I catch and release several daily, but ideally don't want them in my house at all, or to find dead bees unexpectedly if I didn't spot them soon enough!

The flues are currently blocked with chimney sheep's but several still somehow find their way in.

TIA.

sure it's mason bees? not a swarm of honey bees that's settled there?

tbh look up bee keeping assiciations in your area, they might be able to advise.

all bees are protected and you must not remove of destroy any nests yourself.

@greenacrylicpaint Yep 100% sure I have googled images of them to identify, they are also a bit thick and easy to catch.

They are harmless but I also don't want them in my house.

Have you tried those inflatable balloons you can put up there?

I am wondering if there is a natural deterrent you can apply inside, some sort of essential oil they don't like the smell of.

@KievLoverTwo Yep, not balloons, but I do have chimney sheep's I've stuffed up the flues.

We had them and would catch the odd few dozy buggers around the sitting room, pest control came, took outside bricks of chimney off and removed 4ft honey comb and rebuilt and blocked the holes they were going into. They got mightily fucked off and decided to come down the chimney as one big swarm, literally sounded like a washing machine inside the room and people could hear it outside and were knocking on my door saying have you seen what's happening in your sitting room. Had to wait 4 hours for man to come with smoke thing that killed them and then he hoovered them up and was gone. Was terrifying though. Horror movie stuff!!

Got pest control to have a look for you but block chimney before they block the holes that they're using to get into their hive.

We had a wasp nest in a chimney in our old house. DH unloaded a can of Raid up the chimney, closed and sealed up the door with gaffer tape, then went to bed. We woke up the next morning to a carpet of dead wasps. Needless to say, he was tasked with cleaning them up. Apart from a few dead stragglers over the next few days that dealt with the problem.

Not suggesting this for bees, mind you…

Masonry bees are solitary. I know this because I have 000’s of bees in my loft which I first thought were masonry bees. They are honey bees. The bee man told me after the first swarming when the hive got too big for the amount of them. We have no idea where the hive might be and could be in a location that pest control can’t reach. So we now don’t use the loft 😂 You are actually allowed to control bees which have invaded your home and could pose a threat to life. Unfortunately not many pest control people will go into a loft space. The bee man told me if I can coexist with them to leave them because if they are destroyed two things might happen: 1. The honey might start to leak through the ceiling as the hive is no longer worked on or 2. Another swarm will move in and replace the one you just destroyed to steal the honey. I’d phone the local bee keeping association to get advice if you can and they may be able to give you some pointers as how to deal with it. My hive now swarms once a year, the bee man comes and gets them and sends us the honey they make. I can’t use the honey from my garden anyway as I have a massive wall of rhododendrons had apparently the honey could be hallucinogenic 🤣