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Project Noah Nature School
Amegilla quadrifasciata
The thorax is densely hairy, while the abdomen alternate black and white stripes. They have very large compound eyes, their long probosces allow them to sip nectar from a variety of flowers and the hairy hind legs facilitate the collection and transport of pollen.
These solitary bees do not build colonies. The females usually lay eggs in a nest excavated by themselves in loose soils. In the cells they store pollen and nectar as food for the larvae, which pupate in Autumn and hatch as adult bees in March.
Spotted on Sep 3, 2011
Submitted on Sep 3, 2011
9 Comments
Now that is teamwork, good job to everyone!
Thanks, monkey-mind and nana-puppet. :) I see a lot of these, but they're so busy all the time it's difficult to capture them in a photo!
Bee ID'd, thanks to Ashish for the help.
Thanks for those sites, Ashish. The second one shows some promise - am now checking up on digger bees.
This will be interesting site for you...
http://schoolnet.gov.mt/tanti/Creatures....
http://www.pamsworld.at/wp-content/uploa...
wow! I never seen something like this - remind me of some carpenter bee, of some sort
I thought it was a hummingbird moth to start with, Peter, but it looks far too small to me. Ashish, not sure about it being a bumblebee - again, it looks too small. Will do some research.
Bumble bee..
It looks like some of the Hummingbird Moths of the Americas maybe you could start there