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tai haku Nurse Bee
Joined: 16 Sep 2015 Posts: 35 Location: guernsey
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Posted: Sat May 14, 2016 6:47 pm Post subject: Wild bees of Guernsey |
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So since I posted pictures of our Colletes colony I've received the wonderful Field Guide to the Bees of Great Britain and Ireland and have been working on identifying some of the bees we have in our orchard (as well as further afield). I thought it'd be fun to share where we've got to (identifications subject to correction!) and continue to update. I've fallen in love with the tiny kleptoparasitic nomad bees; we have several species only some of which are identifiable...
The easiest for me is Nomada fucata with its single spot.
followed by the Yellow-legged nomad bee, Nomada succinta
This could be one of a couple of species but shows characters that should make it Nomada flava
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Tavascarow Silver Bee

Joined: 24 Jun 2008 Posts: 962 Location: UK Cornwall Snozzle
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Posted: Sat May 14, 2016 6:58 pm Post subject: |
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Beautiful images.
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tai haku Nurse Bee
Joined: 16 Sep 2015 Posts: 35 Location: guernsey
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Posted: Sat May 14, 2016 7:03 pm Post subject: |
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there are a few genera I've only found one species of in the garden so far. Apis is one obviously.....
Red Mason Bee, Osmia bicornis. We have some mason bee boxes up but they ain't using them
This is one the identification of which completely flumoxed me but a friendly chap on the internet tells me its one of the metallic green furrow bees Lassioglossum sp. - there are 3 options and it'd take collection and a microscope to go any further. It was absolutely tiny...
and of course the aforementioned ivy bees, Colletes hederae
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tai haku Nurse Bee
Joined: 16 Sep 2015 Posts: 35 Location: guernsey
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Posted: Sat May 14, 2016 7:03 pm Post subject: |
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Tavascarow wrote: | Beautiful images.
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Thanks! |
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tai haku Nurse Bee
Joined: 16 Sep 2015 Posts: 35 Location: guernsey
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Posted: Sun May 15, 2016 11:47 am Post subject: |
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and our bumbles....
Bumbles are weird here compared to the UK:
Our buff-tailed bumblebees look like white-tailed bumble bees. This is Bombus terrestris terrestris, a different subspecies to the UK's
and our common carder bees look more like brown-banded carder bees...This is Bombus pascuorum.
Bombus
This is a worker of the Early Bumblebee I think, Bombus pratorum. The only one I've seen so far...
I still have at least one species of bumblebee in the garden to photograph (red-tailed) and suspect I have cuckoo bees kicking around also. |
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4nd73j New Bee
Joined: 05 Jan 2017 Posts: 5 Location: England, Nottingham, Stapleford, Nottinghamshire
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Posted: Sat Jan 07, 2017 4:27 am Post subject: Re: Wild bees of Guernsey |
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some really beautiful brightly coloured bees there!! |
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tai haku Nurse Bee
Joined: 16 Sep 2015 Posts: 35 Location: guernsey
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Chippy House Bee
Joined: 26 Sep 2016 Posts: 15 Location: Cornwall
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Posted: Sun Apr 02, 2017 8:18 am Post subject: |
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What a fantastic collection of photographs, thanks for these.  |
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arewethereyet House Bee
Joined: 26 Jul 2017 Posts: 12 Location: Wisbech, Cambridgeshire
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Posted: Wed Jul 26, 2017 4:20 pm Post subject: |
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I love your bees and your photographs. Thank you |
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catchercradle Golden Bee

Joined: 31 May 2010 Posts: 1551 Location: Cambridge, UK
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Posted: Wed Jul 26, 2017 7:04 pm Post subject: |
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Love all the images,
Quote: | Our buff-tailed bumblebees look like white-tailed bumble bees. |
The workers and males look virtually identical between the two species. Only the queens are identifiable at a quick glance.
I have identified colletes using microscopy and a key. I didn't have the time to narrow it down to which particular colletes species. |
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