Masked Bees

Morning thunderstorms. One of those days when it's brightest early in the morning then progressively darker as the storm looms in from the west. I could read on the porch at 6 a.m., by 8 a.m. I had to turn on lights to see the page. About an hour later the storm hit, fierce straight-line winds followed by heavy rain. And then it was over. All as programmatic as Beethoven's Sixth.

With the Goat's Beard newly blossoming and a few stray Ground Elder in bloom as well, I didn't need to set foot outside our backyard to see plenty of insects. For a short while late in the day when the sun nearly came free of the clouds, bees arrived at the flowers in droves, accompanied by a few flies and beetles, even a butterfly or two. My attention fixed upon what appeared to be some very small, mosquito-sized wasps. Black and yellow, slim and sleekit, these wee hymenopterans were (as I eventually remembered) Masked Bees, of the genus Hylaeus.

Certainly the coloration and the absence of pollen-gathering hairs make the Masked Bees the most wasp-like in appearance of all the bees. And yet they are bees and they need to gather pollen. These bees fill their crops with nectar and pollen and regurgitate the mix into the nest cell. Like other members of Colletidae, their provisions are protected by a cellophane-like lining to their cells. These interesting and diminutive bees nest in the narrow hollows of dead twigs and plant stems.

Posted on June 12, 2017 04:27 AM by scottking