This week the weather has turned more seasonal. Rain drizzle, Autumn leaves falling and cooler evening temperatures signals to me; mouse guards. As the temperatures cool off the bees cluster within the hive to keep themselves warm and at a constant temperature. The cozy bees hardly ever break from this group togetherness allowing a freezing mouse to waltz on in through the hive entrance. To a mouse this is like hitting the jackpot. To the bees the invasion spells disaster.

The mouse guard is a rather low tech device. Requires no wifi, or broadband. Just a wire cutter, some screen mesh to allow the bees to come and go but no entrée for a mouse. You can easily spent 15 bucks on a thin metal strip with some holes drilled into it. Or you can use wire mesh like I did. But believe it or not in this high tech world and the internet I couldn’t find a definitive answer in the mesh size. I ended up purchasing 1/4” mesh only to discover the bees were apprehensive about going through. A few did but I wasn’t satisfied. Several sources indicated a mouse could get through a 1/2” opening but the 1/4” seemed small. So I have determined 3/8” openings on the mesh are best. Ha, ha. I took a screwdriver and made the opening slightly bigger and voilà the bees acted like nothing was there. No sharp edges for wings or toes to get caught on.