Another pollinator

This one is not a bee.

Syrphid fly on Queen Anne's Lace, Daucus carota.

The syrphids, or hover flies, sometimes mimic bees and wasps, but their antennae are short and stubby. A bee's antennae are longer, and elbowed. And, in proportion, the flies' eyes are larger than the bee's.

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Y este no es una abeja. Es una mosca de los sírfidos, que comunmente se confunden con las abejas y avispas. Pero las antenas de las moscas, incluyendo los sírfidos, son muy cortas, sin ángulos. Las antenas de las abejas son más largas, y tienen una articulación muy obvia. Y, con respeto a su tamaño, los ojos de la tribu de las moscas son más grandes que los de las abejas.

Esta mosca está buscando su alimento en las flores de zanahoria silvestre, Daucus carota, conocida en inglés como "encaje de la Reina Ana".

Caught in passing

A bee between two foxgloves:

Hurry, hurry! So much to harvest, so short a summer!

I thought at first glance that this was a honeybee; not hairy, brightly striped. Then I looked again. The black section down the centre of the abdomen was not a honeybee pattern. Syrphid flies are patterned like this, but she has the bee antennae, and in another photo, I could see that she's carrying her saddlebags.

Half hidden, busy.

Cropped photo, showing her saddlebags.

I think that she might possibly be a wool carder bee; I found these on a list of common pollinators of BC. I'll send a photo in to BugGuide. They will know.

Bee, beetle, rose

The Nootka roses are blooming. And the beetles and bees are busy.

Almost hairless bee, with her legs covered in pollen. And a tiny beetle, up there on the tip of the top left petal.

Another rose, another bee, with bigger saddlebags.

Here she is, zoomed in.

Years ago, I posted a sort of comparison of the different bees and bee mimics I'd seen on the Lower Mainland. I went back to it today for help in identifying these bees. It was a good reminder of the things to look for, but not much help with this set. At least they're not bee mimics, syrphid flies and the like; they have long, jointed antennae, round abdomens, and those saddlebags. And they're female: only the females carry the saddlebags, to bring home the groceries in.

I like the way they're so glossy that they reflect the pink of the rose petals.

More of those tiny beetles coming tomorrow: I took at least 30 photos, hoping for one in which most of them behaved, so I've got some sorting to do.

On a wild rose

The wild roses are blooming, and bees of all sizes and shapes are happily harvesting pollen. One small bee was too busy to worry about me and my camera.

A long, skinny, non-fuzzy bee. Her* saddlebags are half full of yellow pollen.

"Gotta check the back side, too! Don't want to miss any!"

And I always have to ask; is it a bee or a bee mimic?

Bee. Fuzzy photo, but shows the eyes and double wings.

This one's a bee. Small eyes; a hover fly's eyes take up most of its head. Four wings, two stained-glass ones, two folded underneath. Long antennae, with an "elbow". Flies have stubby little antennae. And the saddlebags for carrying pollen, showing she's a female.

Black-tailed bumblebee

Bumbling about in a rhododendron ...

Bombus melanopygus

In most of the photos I have of these native bees, it is difficult to verify that they do, in fact, have four wings; here, in spite of the interference from the rhododendron naughty bits, the second wing shows up clearly.

Another photo, showing the black tail that gives this species its common name.

I still have trouble identifying bees and bee mimics. Almost every time, I go back to my post from 2008, "Once upon a time, bees were bees ...", where I sorted some of the locals out, with the help of two experts from BugGuide. Even there, though, I have a couple of unidentified ones. I'll have to look for better specimens this summer.

Bee heaven

We went to Centennial Beach without checking the tide tables, and found the beach reduced to a narrow strip of stones. We turned inland and dawdled through the dunes.

This area, just south of the park area, is mostly loose sand, anchored by sea rocket and scratchy dune grasses. Here and there, low-growing purple beach peas find spots sheltered by old logs; escapees from landscaped yards, poppies, euphorbia and huge mounds of evergreen rose bushes, line the inland edge.  The sea rocket is in full bloom now, covered with small, pale flowers, their colours eclipsed by the bright yellow and orange of the bees that feed on them.

Native orange bumblebee, Bombus melanopygus*.

Another bumblebee, in yellow and black. An older bee, probably, going bald.

The flowers are productive; note this bee's full pollen sac on his leg.

A different species, probably. The abdomen is black, with faint stripes. Possibly the Eastern bumblebee?

On euphorbia, a wasp I don't recognize.

In the center of a rose, more yellow and black stripes. Another wasp?

No. This one's a honeybee, Apis mellifera.

*Note: all bee/fly/wasp IDs are tentative. I am often wrong, and appreciate corrections.

That's no bee!

This bee mimic was foraging on tiny thistles in the Reifel Island bird sanctuary.

A syrphid fly, probably*.

It's cheating: to simulate bees' antennae, it holds two legs out in front of its head. And it's about the size of a bee, and furry; any bird that skips bees will pass this one by, too.

A bee has four wings. A fly, like this one, has two. Birds aren't supposed to notice this.

Bees have nicely rounded abdomens; syrphid flies' bellies are so thin they look squashed. This one curves downward at the back, so it looks fat from a bird's eye view. From the side, however, the fakery is exposed; that belly is flat!

Notice the unusual shape of the wings; scalloped at the rear end.

I was fooled, too, at least until I got home and looked at the photos. I have advantages a bird doesn't, even with their superior eyes.

* A similar one, from Ontario is here, on BugGuide. Ours is probably in the same Subfamily, Eristalinae.

Wordless, almost

... because I can never shut up completely.


Bee or bee mimic? These guys are driving me crazy!

See BugGirl's, Things that aren't bees #1, and Things ... #2.
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Once upon a time, bees were bees ...

... and they were all bumblebees. Then I started looking at them. And they were all different. So, eventually, I checked BugGuide.

Several days later, I have bees, honeybees, bumblebees, sweat bees (Sweat bees?!), carpenter bees, cuckoo bees, and more buzzing around in my head. I may not recover.

Did you know that BugGuide has 6,452 photos of bees? In 273 pages? And that's only in the US and Canada!

I posted this photo a few days ago:

Common Eastern Bumblebee, Bombus impatiens

A nice, normal bumblebee, I thought. I sent the photo to BugGuide, for an ID. A couple of the other bees on this clump of asters were different, so I sent them in, too, even though the photos were a bit on the fuzzy side.

There were a couple of honeybees.

Apis mellifera

And a Sweat Bee.

Halictini

BugGuide says that,

A few species are attracted to sweat, and will sometimes sting if disturbed, though the sting is not very painful.

So that explains the name.

Both of these are very common bees here; going over my old photos, I found several of each.

And there was a Syrphid fly, masquerading as a bee:

Syritta pipiens

Sure enough, I had a few photos of them, too.

But the first one, the "normal" bumblebee, turned out to be a bit of a surprise; BugGuide's bee man, John Ascher, wrote:

Looks like a Bombus impatiens male
This isn't supposed to be in British Columbia!

Here is what BG has to say about the range:

Eastern North America, from Ontario to Maine and south to south Florida (Miami area). Common on Atlantic coast; much less common near the western edge of its range (eastern ND, central NE, western KS, eastern TX).
Now widely used for greenhouse pollination in California and Mexico, far outside its native range. In the West it is used to replace the previously used western species Bombus occidentalis, because most wild and commercial populations of Bombus occidentalis disappeared after this species was developed for use by the bumble bee industry. Efforts are underway to obtain permits authorizing use of exotic B. impatiens for outdoor field pollination in California, where a very similar and very closely related species, the California native Bombus vosnesenskii, is abundant. In Mexico, B. ephippiatus is an abundant and potentially usable native alternative to B. impatiens.

(My emphasis)

The page was contributed in 2006, so it is possible that the species is now being used outdoors in California. Could it have wandered up the coast from there, or has it been imported for use here?

(**Update: John Ascher commented, on BugGuide, that it must be an escapee:

Bombus impatiens is found in British Columbia due to the irresponsible greenhouse pollination industry, which continues to degrade biodiversity by importing non-native bees and inevitably their parasites.)

I checked the Discover Life map for this bee, and found a reference to one specimen found here last year. It is the only one in my own photos.

Searching for them in my "Bumblebee" file, I found others, to be categorized under "None of the above":

Orange bumblebee**

Tsawwassen bee

Orange-bodied bee, Strathcona*

Yellow and black bee

I learned something else: bees go bald as they age. Which makes the whole game more confusing; is a given bee bare because it's old, or because that's characteristic of the species?

And then, there's that nasty word, "mimic", that shows up in phrases like "bees, wasps, and mimics". My head aches.

*Update # 2: See first comment. The Orange-bodied bee from Strathcona, seems to be one of those terrible mimics. It looks like it's really an Eristalis, another of the Syrphid flies, sometimes called a Drone Fly. Thanks, Beatriz!

**Update # 3: See third comment. The Orange bumblebee is a Bombus melanopygus male, and native to this area. Thanks again, John!

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