A Gift of Pollen

 

A dark, velvety Andrena mining bee landed on my hand and proceeded to groom. It was a beautiful interaction. In the final picture of the series you can see the gift of pollen she left on my hand as a little gift.

Spring Meadow at Mountainview Cemetery

Jasna and I visited the meadows at Mountainvew cemetery. This scruffy patch is a perfect site for little ground nesting bees. I actually find this bare soil very pleasing as a break from the normalized lawns. There's some interesting plants and rocks here.

We alse say many of these bee flies, which parasitize ground-nesting bees. They are strangely aggressive. We saw one give a roller derby side check to a little mason bee.

The meadow is blooming with flax and baby blue eyes and there are little blue flowers in one of the mossy lawns. This little one is a kind of Veronica, or Speedwell.

This is not micro clover, but black medic, an introduced weed that does have tiny flowers that feed bees.

After visiting the cemetery I sought sanctuary in the back yard, where a couple of columbines have appeared this year, as if by magic. I am so pleased! This one has medium-sized corollas. Now I am inspired to save the seeds and use them for some guerilla gardening.

The sweet cicely flowers are full of tiny ants.

Meanwhile, in my neighbor Catherine's yard, the roses are blooming and host the newly hatched velvety Andrena mining bees. They are also visiting the black raspberry flowers and forget-me nots in our back yard. Since I pulled up out back lawn, all sorts of ground-nesting bees have moved in.