Posts Tagged ‘native bees’
10 bee questions answered
1. How long does a honeybee live? How long does a queen live? A worker bee typically lives six weeks during the summer, and during that time it has a variety of different jobs — nurse, undertaker, architect, cleaner, attendant, guard, forager. (Read more about worker bee jobs here.) However, worker bees that live in Read More »
Read MoreNative Bees: Gentle and buzz-worthy
The mining bees in the Andrenidae family are incredibly gentle bees. According to “Bees: An Identification and Native Plant Forage Guide” by Heather Holm, a park in Minneapolis is the home to thousands of Andrena nests each year, but most people have no idea that they are walking right over them. These bees are solitary Read More »
Read MoreNative bees: These bees plastic-wrap their brood cells
Do you love blueberries? Then you should love the genus Colletes of native bees! These are one of several types of native bees that collect pollen from both highbush and lowbush blueberry flowers. Colletes validus has an elongated, narrow head that helps it fit into the tight flower opening where it eats nectar and collects pollen that will be transferred Read More »
Read MoreNative bees: Mason bees are fantastic pollinators
Mason bee (Osmia lignaria) Mason bees might be the best pollinators of all bees. Instead of wetting pollen and putting it in pollen sacs like honeybees, mason bees are covered in hair that collects pollen as they move around, searching for nectar. They can certainly carry a lot of pollen and significant pollinators for apple, cherry Read More »
Read MoreNative bees: The true sweat bees
We’ve all been outside drinking a pop at a picnic, when these little black-and-yellow creatures start flitting around and trying to get into the drink. “Sweat bees,” someone will say, shaking his or her head. “They’re so annoying.” Learning about bees as we put together the bee identification spinner for the new Pollinator Paradise addition, Read More »
Read MoreNative bees: Exotic honeybees and their Apidae family
We’ve talked about the ways that native bees differ from honeybees (read that here) and how great of pollinators they are (read that here), but how do you identify native bees? There are seven known families of bees worldwide, and six live in North America: Andrenidae, Apidae, Colletidae, Halictidae, Megachilidae and Melittidae. The family Stenotritidae only Read More »
Read MoreIt’s not a bee — 5 types of wasps, hornets and yellowjackets you may see in Iowa
“Ah, a bee!” It’s such a common reaction when a buzzing insect comes near a person, whether adult or youth. But the word “bee” is overused, and most people actually don’t what insect they are encountering and why they usually shouldn’t be afraid of it. Last week, we talked about the difference between honeybees and Read More »
Read MoreSix ways native bees differ from honeybees
People often use the term bee when talking about any kind of buzzing creature outside — it could be a honeybee, a bumble bee, a mason bee, a sweat bee or even a wasp or yellowjacket. However, it’s important to differentiate between the different kinds of bees. That may be difficult since the U.S. has Read More »
Read MoreMason bees might be better pollinators than honeybees!
If you didn’t have bad luck, you wouldn’t have any luck at all. Someone posted this about our osprey nest camera blowing down again this year. We feel kind of the same way. This poor camera has been blown down, hasn’t had enough sun, and when the camera did work last year the osprey chicks Read More »
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