Just put up mason bee houses. You need to build them as per directions you will find on the web (each type of bee has it's own size hole and depth it likes) and hang it where you have seen carpenter bees busy about the house. Usually a spot with some shade.
Some instructions say to hang them very high on the gables of a house, but I've found the bees tend to hang out here a bit closer to the ground in Atlanta, maybe 6-8' off the ground.

I will be puting up some nests as well, hoping I have a local population that I can build up. I have read that is is better to find locally supplied bees as opposed to west coast, where are online sources for them seem to be. Those of you that have put up nests without adding bees were you successful in attracting mason/orchard bees and do just leave the nest up to emerge naturally in te spring or do you harvest the cocoons and clean etc... as I read many people do. I am hoping just to reline used nesting holes as they are used.

GGGirl,
Most everything I read is pretty specific on OSMIA species, and specifies around 19/64 hole from 4 to 6 inches deep. What other pollinating bees are we able to attract here? Maybe I just have not googled on the right phrases to get the other pollinators. If other size cavities will get some additional pollinators I want try cover as much of the season as possible as I think the OSMIA are pretty much early season, as well as fearing I might not have a local population of OSMIA. I know there are other small wasps and bees I just have not read much on their pollinations benefits and their housing requirements. The best document I have found online is below but is specific to OSMIA.

Here is a link that might be useful: Orchard/Mason Bees

Orchard and mason bees
there are several other native boring bees that may use their holes and there are also carpenter bees. Carpenter bee houses are necessary when you want to keep the bees out of your house and you are an organic gardener. Carpenter bees are responsible for huge amounts of pollination here since the decline of honey bees. They need a different size hole. I host most of these bees in my garden. To keep these bees you need to create habitat, just growing fruit isn't enough! You need to provide pollen for each bee's entire life span.
I have noted a great increase in the yields of my home vegetable garden via both soil management and also by creating bee habitat and pollinator gardens.

Here is a link that might be useful: Native bees (of all kinds) from U of Maine

Thanks GGGirl

I will try some of the smaller diameter nests as well. I will have a hard time coming to terms assisting a Carpenter bee although If I understand what you are saying put up the nest to keep them off your home, which in my site happens to be a log home, and I struggle with them already and not sure I want to build that particular population up.

If you spray for carpenter bees, you will kill all the native mason bees you attract to your nesting spaces! So that is something huge to consider. If you have an out building that you do not spray, that might be a consideration - however you will probably still kill off that population. Now is the time to work on changing over your carpenter bee habits.
Fill each hole with diatomaceous earth or borax. Then take a dowel and plug each hole up. That will stop new bees from emerging. Spraying in the holes will not totally eliminate the baby bees in there, only the first. There will be several in each hole.
After you do that, then you can put up the bee houses for your carpenter bees. It really does work wonderfully well. Each fall, just take your Carpenter Bee houses down and clean out the tubes and kill the baby bees inside if you don't want them. Wash them well to remove bee fermones. Hang them again for next year. It's the existing fermones of baby bees that attract the new adult bees (and the babies also come back as adults) to lay more babies in your house. I had some good luck keeping the bees out by simply regularly washing my home and stopping up bee holes, and removing all mud dauber tubes (after hatching) and using this method for carpenter bees. We did get a lot of them when I moved here.

I use a combination of Drione dust and my son with a tennis racquet. Drione dust is a desicant that I put in Carpenter bee holes with a bellows type duster, and I normally try to do this at evening dusk. It is supposed to have residual of 6 month or longer, and I leave the hole open for a period and then seal it up. If any other bees enter the hole I guess they would be effected, but I am not sure they try.I don't try any of the surface sprays as I don't like being general and effecting the other speicies, and I think they need to be applied way to often. My plantings for the most part have been selected for no spray with the exception of the pears and apples which have almost all been selected as disease resistant cultivars, but I might have to concede a little on them. I hope never to spray at all on the blueberries, figs, Kaki persimmons, figs, Muscadines, Blackberries, Raspberries, Jujube, Pawpaw, Chestnut, Pecans, and Heartnuts.

Strudeldog wrote: "Most everything I read is pretty specific on OSMIA species, and specifies around 19/64 hole from 4 to 6 inches deep."
Yes, according to Phil Torchio, he says 6" and I recall the bulk of his research was in Utah. For me here in B.C., I discovered that for Osmia lignaria propinqua, that 29.5cm (~11 1/2") produced the most female offspring, so if you're looking for future plans of more pollination, consider that. The width I used was 6.5mm (0.26" ~5/16") but why not add some trays with channels 1/16" either side of that. Of course, you risk O.lignaria going in the smaller holes and producing more males.

I just put out mason houses for the first time using the knox cellars systems. Blogged on it: Mason Bees for Wildlife Gardens.

Put out the nester tubes but will not release bees until later, hopefully I can attract some native populations in the meantime. I did ask Knox about bringing bees from WA and they said it would confuse the bees at first but next year their timing would adapt.

We're also making a second house in cut oak logs and I'm just using the Knox diameters, which I would measure and post if you wish. Figure they know what they are doing. I will line the holes though to pull them out in fall. I understand that smoothing out inside of the drilled holes is the biggest issue in making a house.

Here is a link that might be useful: Mason Bees for Wildlife Gardens

gt4889:

A large proportion of online suppliers are based in the pacific northwest, and those bees aren't native to Georgia.

Search online (craigslist, eBay) and call big garden centers, and try to buy bees from a place that raises them EAST of the rocky mountains, and preferably in the South somewhere. Garden clubs and shops will have the best information, as will the agricultural extension offices of regional universities.

Lastly, also search on "Blue orchard bee" and "hornfaced bee" as those are also terms often for the east coast species.

Crown Bees and Pollinator Paradise both appear to sell Eastern bee subspecies, so maybe check them out for purcahse info. The usual buy-by-mail window is December through February.

http://www.crownbees.com/responsibility/buying-the-right-mason-bee
http://www.pollinatorparadise.com/