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.

Magnolia Mating Madness!

As I was coming back from a visit to Camosun bog, I noticed several male bees flying around the blossoms of a pink star magnolia tree, so I stopped to take a closer look.

The blossoms had a spicy floral scent that reminded me of lilies. Usually it's so hard to photograph these little male mining bees, but this time there were several who stopped to sun themselves on the petals. Maybe they were as entranced by the fragrance of the flowers as I was!

The males are thinner and more delicate than the females. They have longer antennae and cute yellow markings on the part of their face called the "clypeus".

As soon as a female arrives on the petal, all the males head straight to her. Male bees hover around the blossoms waiting to pounce on females. This behavior is called lekking. The fastest males with the best endurance win the genetic race.

Next thing you know, the bees are makin' whoopee!

. . . And more whoopee. Or should I say "whoopbee"?!

The strange this is I never see bees foraging in magnolia, and the females don't seem to be going into the flowers for pollen or nectar, so this is a bit of a mystery.

Mining or ground nesting bees  often nest right under their preferred food source. Have you seen bees foraging in magnolia?

Those little sideways eyebrows on the female bee tell us it is a species of Andrena bees.

I noticed some little yellow spots on the petals. This looks suspiciously like bee poop. Maybe that's why the males were pausing on the flowers! Not as romantic as I thought!

Does that look like bee poo to you? You can also see how the light reflects from the petals, creating a sparkling effect. It's likely nice and warm on the petals, which is another reason the males like to sun themselves on the surface.

This male was sunning himself on the ground, waiting for the females to come down and enter their nests. He's got his own lekking technique.

The ground underneath the tree was scrappy and sandy. Apparently it's just what these bees like!

And here you can see the tumulus around the nest hole where the soil has been excavated. I see them as miniature Bugs Bunny holes.

So the next time you stop to smell the magnolias, look for bees makin' whoopee and poopin' on the petals! And watch where you step, because there might be bees underfoot.

Mountainview Cemetery July Bee Safari

My bee safari buddy Jasna accompanied me on a trip to Mountainview Cemetery where we had a few good sightings. In the east meadow we found this andrena mining bee with velvety facial hair, velvet jodphurs and velvety bands of pale hair on her abdomen. She's a beauty. The flower she's sunning herself on is wild brown-eyed Susan.

Jasna spotted another bee (possibly the same species) curled around the stamens of a red geum flower. This is am example of a red flower that bees will visit, in spite of seeing red petals as black.

On a return trip to the same garden I captured a couple of blurry shots of a coelioxys cuckoo bee. Note the prongs on the back of the abdomen. She looked very similar to colletes in the nearby nodding onions, but it has those large green compound eyes. Also, note the way it tilts up its abdomen at the back, like the leafcutter it parasitizes.

There were two patches of nodding onion monopolized by plasterer bees (Colletes). They are hard to photograph because the onions are so low to the ground, and they disappear into the flowers while foraging.

But you can see her tongue here in this shot.

 And note the "prison stripes" on her tear-drop shaped abdomen. The males are smaller, slimmer, with longer antennae. They were impossible to photograph because they were defensively patrolling the nodding onions. Apart from wool carder bees, this is the only other male bee that I have seen using defensive behavior, knocking honeybees right out of the flowers! These bees obviously have a preference for nodding onions, so I am on a mission to get more of the plants and the bees in gardens.

I'm also on a mission to upgrade my bumblebee ID skills, and yes, even including the males, which are very difficult to pin down to species. And I'm beginning to appreciate the subtle beauty of the silvery blonde male bees.

The melissodes digger bees love the abundant Coreopsis grandiflora in the meadow right now. I do wish they would replicate this meadow all along the verge where it is planted.

I love this photo: the long horns of the male melissodes and the dramatic petals of the coreopsis make me a happy camper. Don't the petals look like the strokes of a paintbrush?

Okay, so here we have one of those difficult bee ID's. I posted the photos on Bugguide and Dr. Ascher thinks it's Bombus rufocinctus. This bee has many variations. So many, that bee nerds have a joke: "It's always Bombus rufocinctus." Well, I thought it was funny.

She was the side of a queen, and almost chocolatey in some places.  If she wasn't so large I would have clocked the bee as male. Anyway, I love a surprise.

First Leafcutter Bee of the Season in Vancouver: California Lilacs Bloom

A California lilac shrub stopped me in my tracks at the busy intersection of W4th and MacDonald.The flowers were covered with bees of all stripes scrambling to collect pollen. I watched as their pollen baskets filled and their jodhpurs grew fat with lemony pollen.

There were bumblebees, andrena mining bees, and lots of these solitary bees with striped butts.

Back home in our garden I also spotted the first leafcutter of the season, looking fluffy and freshly hatched. I am amazed at how having three lupins in my back yard has attracted a variety of native bees.

The wool carder bees have also set up shop at the lupins where the males patrol the flowers and mate with the females. I witnessed a male wool carder bee knock a bumblebee queen right out of the flower with a full body check. She didn't even see it coming. Cheeky!

 I also observed a honeybee try her darndest to access lupin pollen or nectar, but she gave up after two valiant attempts. These small bees are sneaking in and gathering pollen, flying under the radar of the possessive wool carder males.

As the blue orchard bees are wrapping it up, the smaller summer mason bees are getting busy. Even this little one can trip the keels of the lupins to daintily  sip the nectar.

I'm also pleased to announce my first sighting of a cuckoo be in the forget-me-nots our back yard. My friend Jasna tells me the rim around the nectar turns from yellow to white once the flower has been pollinated. Cool!