The natives are so tiny that they only produce small quantities of honey. Jeff described the flavour the way I would but it varies depending on the flowers. I tasted one (not mine) so strong in flavour that it was like medicine (not nice medicine). Ours is quite citrus in flavour.
1 Like
Yes Jeff that was out of our Aquaponics system, 2.2kg rainbow trout. Weâre working on a degree of self sustainability, hence the bees. Excellent observation btw.
So back to topic, is there anything I could look for to find a nb colony? They are around as they frequent the veggie patch, Iâd like to support the locals. 
seeing as I canât get a nuc until OctoberâŚ
Hi Greg, well done on the 2.2 kg rainbow trout from your aquaponics system. I havenât been successful in spotting a native bee hive. What has helped me is being listed as a beekeeper in the phone book. Youâd probably need to do a lot of bush walking, looking in all the gaps in trees etc. Find a nice warn sunny day when theyâre out working. Anything under 20degC, theyâll be inside, in that case, very hard to find. Good luck, cheers
I did a mid-winter update on our native bees: #1 to show how the bees insulate the brood during winter & #2 To show how to rescue a weak hive after I learnt my lesson about leaving mower fuel not far from 2 of my hives. This is by request from @Kirsten_Redlich. cheers:)
3 Likes
Thanks Jeff & Wilma. I appreciate you both taking the time to make this video 
Just what I wanted to see! Thereâs a really noticeable difference in the structures from the first one I watched. Amazing too that you can build them up by changing hive positions. I wonder if pheromones are as significant to these as they are to EHBâs? Could that be a reason for increased acceptance, maybe? It looked like some of the bees had a sort of creamy coloured something on them or were carrying, in the stronger 2 hives? Also I was wondering, have you seen the queen in these colonies? Is there a noticeable difference to naked eye between queen & workers, and drones? As always I am inspired to find out more from watching your video.
I have to do some research into Victorian colonising native bees here, I think most are solitary. I would like to have a hive of them myselfâŚif not possible, more videos 
please
p.s Iâm going to go back to your earlier native bee videos in case youâve already talked about the things I was asking.
1 Like
Many thanks @Dawn_SD & @Kirsten_Redlich, to answer your questions Kirsten, I donât know if they accept bees from a different colony because they are coming in with food or not. Honeybees accept foreign bees if they have food. Maybe what you saw was bees bringing in pollen. Yes you can often see the queen, Iâd say she is 3-4 times bigger than the workers & has stripes going across the abdomen. She is never far from the advancing front because as soon as the bees build new comb, she lays eggs in it. I havenât seen what I could clearly distinguish as drones yet.
I think native bees such as these would survive in Victoria if they were taken down there. If they had a well insulated hive & they had the opportunity to gather lots of food during good weather. They donât leave the hive under 20deg. or wet weather.
1 Like
Hi Jeff just found this link re research into Native Bees in QLD in conjunction with Germany.
Hi @JeffH
Just listened to an interesting ABC conversations podcast about Australian native bees you may like.
https://www.abc.net.au/radio/programs/conversations/toby-smith/11075320
Hi Anthony, thanks mate. I love the conversations with Richard Fidler. Iâll bookmark it & listen to it later, cheers