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Bees Around the World
Throughout this class, we have chosen to focus more on the honey bee than on any other type. But since this is Bee Biology and not Honey Bee Biology, I feel that it is appropriate to cover the other types of bees as well, namely the Bumblebee, the Carpenter Bee, the Digger Bee, the Leaf Cutting Bee, the Mason Bee, the Orchid Bee, the Sweat Bee and the Common Honey Bee. ...
Bumblebee is a common name for any group of large, hairy, usually black and yellow, social bees. They are usually found in temperate regions throughout the northern hemisphere, often being found farther north and at higher altitudes than other bees. ... Finally, bumblebees collect less nectar than honey bees, which of course means less honey. ... Then work begins as usual for the bees, but unlike the honey bees, the queen bumblebee even goes out foraging. ...
Carpenter bees are a group of mostly large, metallic-colored bees. ... Both the males and females are mostly black or blue with a metallic sheen and are usually around 2. ... They generally are found throughout the world wherever woody plants abound, and especially in forested regions, such as the tropics. ... Some other species of carpenter bees are the Virginia carpenter bee, the Small carpenter bee which measure 2-3 mm in length, the communal Hairy carpenter bee, and the Mountain carpenter bee which is found in Western North America from as far north as Washington going all the way to Mexico. Right now there are about 730 species of carpenter bees.
Digger bees are a group of robust, fast-flying bees with velvety fur. They range from the size of the common honey bee to as large as the bumblebee, and live all throughout the world. Digger bees mostly nest in the ground or in wood, and line their brood cells with a wax-like secretion; some are even parasitic off other bees. One unique thing about the digger bee though is that many nest in dense aggregations, and swarms of males cruise around the nesting sites searching for emerging females, and in one species the males can even detect the females in the ground before they emerge. ... Some other species of digger bees are the Southeastern blueberry bee which specializes on blueberry plants in its pollen collecting and is more efficient at this than either the honey bee or bumblebee, and the Pallid bee which has a spectacular display of mating behavior in the spring. ... There are several thousand species of digger bees, more than 900 of which are found in the United States and Canada. ... Like the digger bees, leafcutting bees are also found all throughout the world. A few species are communal, with several females sharing a common nest entrance but constructing nest cells and tending their own brood separately, but most leafcutting bees are solitary, and prefer to construct their own nests independently. ... One major subspecies of leafcutting bees is the Alfalfa leafcutting bee which is specially adapted for foraging on alfalfa flowers, which honey bees tend to avoid, and their production is a multi-million dollar business in the United States, Canada and is also very important in Russia. The female leafcutting bee uses around 15 leaf or petal pieces to construct a brood cell, stocking it with pollen and nectar, then laying an egg on the pollen. ... The leafcutter bee’s major threats though, are fungi, other bees and wasps. Around 140 species of leafcutting bees are found in the United States and Canada, but including a large number of related species which do not all build their nests with leaf pieces, there are over 3000 species worldwide, more than 600 of which are in the United States and Canada!
Approximate Word count = 2946
Approximate Pages = 11.8
(250 words per page double spaced)
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