All honeymoons have to end

BB33 had stayed for a second night in our nestbox, much to our excitement, so we came down at 10am to see whether she was there or not. 

Once again, I had expected her to have left the box, so was amazed to see her still in the box in the far corner - near where the empty honey-water holder was. Outside the box, both the honey-water and pollen holders (plastic bottle tops) had toppled over and were more or less empty.

We have no way of knowing whether this was some creature in the night that caused that, or whether BB33 had been out to collect from them and had caused them to empty and lose balance. If BB33 had already been outside the box and then returned inside, that would have been significant, as we have never had a bee leave the box and return to (inside) it. 

I quickly re-sited and replenished the pots, not knowing whether BB33 could emerge at any moment and expect some breakfast on hand.

The timing was all rather serendipitous, as within 10 minutes she was buzzing and on the move, and emerged from the nestbox. She crawled over the moss at the entrance and completely ignored the honey-water pot right in her path. She made straight for the pollen pot at the bottom of the moss (which may add weight to the idea she had already been out and knew where it was) and then took flight to the flowers nearby (only about 30cm away). She probed these intensely looking for nectar, but it seemed as though we was struggling to find it. Then after about 45 seconds, she took off, circled twice and left. 

I took this opportunity to very quickly fill the internal container with honey-water, with about 1.5mls of honey-water (on a 30:70 mix). I estimate during the time we saw her drinking from this (90 mins) she consumed 0.75 - 1ml of the liquid (which is my estimate of how much was actually left in the container). We don't know how much this replenishes her as we've been unable to find any data on this yet on the internet and whether this would be enough for whole day. (Well, it must have been on the first day as she never went anywhere!)

We were ever-so-hopeful she would return today but she hasn't. We can't know whether the issue with the honey-water being upturned (and the lack of supply inside the box) is the cause, or whether she would have gone anyway. But I can't help feel a little bit frustrated, if not annoyed, that those issues occured. But there was simply nothing we can do about it, until we develop some kind of live feeding system inside the box.

We have to console ourselves with the fact that she chose to stay two whole nights in our box in beautiful weather, so some of the parameters must be acceptable to her.