I just saw that my fanpage on Facebook has exceeded 1,000 followers โ thank you!
The honeybee is unimpressed. Their colonies can have about 50,000 workers. By comparison, bumblebee colonies range from several dozen to around 500 individuals. But this fanpage is about non-honeybees, so we don’t care about the honeybee’s opinion.
The females of some bee species collect pollen only from certain plants’ flowers. Those that collect pollen from a single plant species (or genus, according to some authors) are called monolectic, while those that can choose from a larger group of plants (but no larger than a single family) are called oligolectic. These bees can’t live in areas where their food plants are not present. If these plants are rare or endangered, so are the bees. There is no single plant group on which all oligolectic bees forage; some depend on members of the Asteraceae family, while others specialize on the Fabaceae, Ericaceae, Malvaceae or others. In the picture below you can see a large scabious mining bee (Andrena hattorfiana), which collects pollen almost exclusively from field scabious.
One could think that larvae of oligo- and monolectic bees can’t survive on other pollen types than those collected by their mothers. Surprisingly, it is sometimes the other way around. There are experiments showing that the larvae of specialists developed perfectly well on other pollen types. Conversely, generalist larvae may experience difficulties when fed a monodiet typical for oligolectic species. For example, bumblebees don’t develop well on Asteraceae pollen, whereas females of species such as Colletes daviesanus and Heriades truncorum feed their larvae almost exclusively on pollen from this very family.
It seems that being a larva of food specialist may be challenging and require special adaptations. Adult females of these species are limited in their pollen choice, which can cause problems if their preferred plant type becomes scarce. So what are the advantages of specialization? In the case of plant species which are hard to use (eg. those with structurally complicated flowers, or chemically protected pollen), specialists have fewer competitors. Also, mastering the art of foraging on one or a few species could make it quicker and more efficient.
Taxonomists are scientists who study species. They seek to answer questions such as which traits distinguish one species from another, and how species evolve. When a taxonomist discovers a species that is new to science, they have the right to name it. Each scientific name has two parts: the first part is usually fixed, as it refers to the genus to which the species belongs. The discoverer is free to choose the second part. Provided they comply with the rules set out in the International Code of Zoological Nomenclature, they can choose anything. Some taxonomists name species based on their characteristic traits โ for instance, ‘bicornis’ means ‘two-horned’ and refers to the small horns on the face of the female red mason bee (Osmia bicornis). Others honour important figures in science or people who are important to them. You can also find names that refer to popular culture or are humorous.
Today’s post was published on Instagram in cooperation with Pollinator Academy. From their website: “The Pollinator Academy is a European, open source platform for sharing taxonomic knowledge. It is a learning platform aiming to strengthen taxonomic capacity throughout Europe and was created through close collaboration between specialists and trainers from different institutes.” Among the training materials, there is one about taxonomy and naming new species – check it out here ๐
Recently, I had the pleasure of admiring a nesting aggregation of my beloved ivy bees in the company of other melittologists. At one point, I heard someone say, ‘Here’s the waiting ball.’ As you might have guessed, I misheard โ it was actually the mating ball. But my imagination began to run: what should a waiting ball of bees look like? You can see my idea here.
I first posted this cartoon on my social media. I wasn’t sure if you would find it funny, but after receiving positive feedback, I decided to share it here as well.
I drew this cartoon during a bee identification course. It was excellent… and intensive! We worked so much on identification keys that they became my first association with the word ‘key’ ๐
It’s a third year with the ivy bee (Colletes hederae) present in my country, and I’m still excited about it. I will be looking for them soon. Did you know that the ivy bee, which loves ivy so much that its flight period is fine-tuned to the flowering of this plant, is actually not a pollen specialist? In the absence of ivy flowers, it can visit heather or Asteraceae, for example. When foraging on these plants, I imagine it can quite easily be confused with other Colletes species, especially the closely related Heather Colletes (Colletes succinctus). The latter is also polylectic, with a strong preference for Ericaceae.
Parasitic bees are known as ‘cuckoos’ because they do not build nests or care for their offspring. Most of them sneak into the nests of other bee species when the owner bee is out collecting food, or open nests that have already been closed and are unguarded, and lay their own eggs there. With solitary bees, it is quite easy to find a moment when the mother is away. In colonies of social species, however, there is usually somebody home. Cuckoo bumblebees solve this problem by fighting and replacing the queen, making them more social parasites than classic “cuckoos”. Blood bees (genus Sphecodes) have another strategy that is even crueller, which Danforth and co-authors refer to as the “scorched earth attack” in their book The Solitary Bees. The female Sphecodes enters the nest of a social or communal host and kills or repels (probably using pheromones) as many bees as possible. Once the colony has been destroyed, the female blood bee can parasitise the brood cells undisturbed.
Some bees can forage on a wide taxonomic variety of flowering plants. Others need a more restricted set of species, sometimes a very narrow one. Bee species that rely on flowers from one plant family, or a subset of it, are called oligolectic. Those that choose only one plant species (or, according to some authors, one plant genus) are called monolectic. On the cartoon you can see a female silvery pantaloon bee Dasypoda argentata, a narrow specialist on cream scabious Scabiosa ochroleuca.
Today is my big day! Yesterday, I received Laurence Packer’s Beepedia. I plan to read it and then publish a review of it on my Polish-language blog about bees (I post there photos and longer texts in Polish, but if you would like to take a look, I hope the translator will be able to handle it). Before I had a chance to start reading the book, a friend wrote to tell me that he had found me inside (thank you, Robert!). I’m famous! That’s good motivation to post here more often.
And here’s the mention of me – in case you didn’t believe me! ๐
Anthophora bimaculata is one of the species with an exceptionally high-pitched tone produced during flight. I know only one other bee with that character – Bombus sylvarum, a bumblebee that has earned the common name “shrill carder bee”. Do you know other examples of bees buzzing like a mosquito?
Have you ever wondered what bees think about the unauthorised posting of their image online?
Non-honey bees 