We got 0.41 inches of rain yesterday. And I am grateful. However I have heard those of you south of our location got more. Lucky you!
It was a mostly cloudy day here with just a short window of less cloudy weather around the time I took my noonish walk. Actually the sun came out for a short time then.
Every year I look for small holes in the ground along our front fence. And now they have appeared. And yes, it looks a bit like a fire ant mount. However if you see the holes and poke it and no fire ants come swarming out you might have ground bees. Mine our very docile and don’t seem to mind me observing them.
One or two could just barely be seen.
When it gets warmer I will be able to see more of them. Did you catch the tiny yellowish thrips in the movie?
The Spring Beauty (Claytonia virginica) was pretty in pink!
So I took a couple of moments to study them. And what I noticed was that the anthers that were still pink had not been totally stripped of the pollen. In this photo you can see three of the anthers no longer had pollen. As I sat there a honey bee was buzzing loudly nearby.
A couple of these tiny flies were landing on the Spring Beauties too!
Several of the White-margined Burrower Bugs (Sehirus cinctus) were on the grass and Henbit that was mixed in with the Spring Beauties. However I didn’t observe any on the Spring Beauties.
So what had really caught my attention was this bee. It moved quickly from one flower to the next. Moreover, it was only going to the Spring Beauties.
Finally it was still so I could observe the pink pollen it had gathered!
Then it moved on! However it did leave some for some others. 🙂 After getting home, I identified as the Spring Beauty Miner Bee or Spring Beauty Andrena (Andrena erigeniae). This species only likes pink pollen! There are 1200 species of andrenids in North American in the Andreninae. In the genus Andrena there are 60 species. (Borror & DeLong) However, the Spring Beauty Miner Bee is the only one that specifically prefers the Spring Beauty. It takes it pink pollen back to underground abode for its larvae. The adults only live a few weeks.
The more you know, the more you see and the more you see, the more you know
4 Comments
That nursing amphibian is something else. Truth really is stranger than fiction. And i always feel sorry for the pollen laden bees. Their load looks so heavy. We got bout .75” rain. Got bout 2” near the farm.
Really special bee – and pink pollen too – for some reason thought it was always yellow. Will look forward to seeing more of those ground bees at the front fence too.
Critters in the videos running from human voices was really interesting – sure says something about us humans for sure.
That nursing amphibian is something else. Truth really is stranger than fiction. And i always feel sorry for the pollen laden bees. Their load looks so heavy. We got bout .75” rain. Got bout 2” near the farm.
Really crazy amphibian! The bees do have heavy loads. I always think they are wearing bloomers. You got a good rain.
Wow a special bee!!!!!
Really special bee – and pink pollen too – for some reason thought it was always yellow. Will look forward to seeing more of those ground bees at the front fence too.
Critters in the videos running from human voices was really interesting – sure says something about us humans for sure.