World Bee Day

The internet informs me that today, 20th May, is World Bee Day. This seems an apposite time to mention the many species of bee which we saw whilst on holiday in Perthshire. In mid-April, when we set off for Blairgowrie, there weren't too many species on the wing in Orkney. Mainly White-tailed, Buff-tailed and Common Carder bumblebees, Honey Bees and a few species of solitary bee, such as the Clarke's Mining Bee we were fortunate to find in our garden. Wending our way south (so not making a beeline) certainly increased the number of species we might see. In fact, the cottage garden was a good place to look for bees. With plenty of nectar- and pollen-rich flowers, plus a profusion of tree blossom, sitting in a sunny spot nearly always produced something buzzy. There were wasps too, busy making papier mâché for their nests using shavings from the owner's garden fence.

Before setting off, I had not even considered what sort of bumbles we might bumble into, mainly due to the expectation of a fortnight of rain which would not be very insect-friendly. However, the dry and often sunny weather was certainly appreciated by bees and humans alike. Fortuitously, we did think to take along a bee ID guide. The big plus during our two weeks of wildlife watching was finding bees with red bums. We do not have any red-tailed bumblebee species in Orkney, save for one historical and possibly dubious record. So to encounter queens of Red-tailed, Early and Bilberry Bumblebees was an absolute highlight.

Walks further afield produced a Gypsy Cuckoo Bee, a Garden Bumblebee and an Orange-tailed Mining Bee by the River Ericht, whilst a visit to a Bluebell wood gave us an aggregation of Clarke's Mining Bees and their parasitic companions, the Early Nomad Bees. There were plenty of solitary bees which I didn't manage to photograph well enough to be able to ID them, but we were very satisfied with our holiday haul. Five of these species were lifers for Megan, and at least one of them was a lifer for me.

House and garden: White-tailed Bumblebee, Buff-tailed Bumblebee, Common Carder Bee, Tree Bumblebee, Red-tailed Bumblebee, Early Bumblebee, Early Nomad Bee;

Bluebell Wood: Clarke's Mining Bee;

Glen Doll: Bilberry Bumblebee;

River Ericht footpath: Garden Bumblebee, Gypsy Cuckoo Bee, Orange-tailed Mining Bee.

A Bilberry Bumblebee queen

A female Clarke's Mining Bee

An Early Bumblebee queen

A female Early Nomad Bee

Gypsy Cuckoo Bee

Honey Bee

Orange-tailed Mining Bee

Tree Bumblebee

Nomad Bees are kleptoparasites, usually of Mining Bees, where a Nomad Bee will enter the nest burrow of the Mining Bee and lay an egg in an unsealed cell. Once the egg hatches, the Nomad grub will eat the host egg or grub and also the food store in the cell.

Here's a bit of footage of a Clarke's Mining Bee entering a nest, then several minutes later (edited out) an Early Nomad Bee follows her in. I did stay and watch until the Nomad Bee re-emerged, presumably having laid her egg, before the lure of Bluebells called me back to botanising.

Perhaps I should've ended a blogpost about World Bee Day on a slightly more upbeat note?