Balcony bees and bugs

(And spiders and other creatures, too, but they didn't alliterate.)

Tracking the visitors and resident organisms of a third-floor urban balcony in central Germany. Anything that enters the balcony space and stays in one place long enough to be photographed gets documented.

The space is approximately 3 x 1 meters, south-east facing, with as many containers and planters as I can fit on it, as well as a small compost box. The plants are a mixture of vegetables, herbs, and native pollinator-friendly flowering plants, cultivated in a somewhat haphazard and unkempt fashion. The building is situated in a mid-density neighborhood within 200 meters of both the green strip along the river and the botanical garden.

The balcony is home to several species of wild bees, some of whom use human-provided nesting tubes, while others have claimed various found spaces on their own initiative.

It is also home to breeding populations of multiple species of spiders and miscellaneous other arthropods. The human caretaker is somewhat ambivalent about her arachnid neighbors, but strives for a harmonious coexistence. less ↑