woagh….. bees………..

I eagerly await my full iNaturalist year in review once I finish uploading all of December's photos, but I am finished with all of last year's Hymenoptera, so I've made myself a mini review just for them! Without further ado...

In comparison, in 2024 I had 548 observations of 80 species. It is a shame how few sawflies I saw, I'll have to try and seek some out next year

(Added extra labels since it's not interactive for you guys) Sooo many gall wasps this year! I actually only had one gall wasp observation before this year which is criminal, I have no clue how I didn't notice them earlier. I am the type to photograph and upload pretty much every individual of even common species I see so I end up with one william honeybees and bumblebees despite my waspy affinities

Nothing too suprising here. When it's warm the bugs are active and so am I, with the dip in May probably being because of exam season or something. Once it started getting colder there were galls everywhere so it didn't immediately dip

Along with some of my favourite observations of each from this year. We had a handful of cellophane bees nesting in our garden and they had a mating swarm going there for days. Also my first honeybee drone!

For anyone unfamiliar, lifer means a new taxon you haven't seen before. Presuming the tentative ones are correct, that would bring me up to 33 hymenoptera families overall

And now an unordered dump of some more observations from this year I haven't been able to include thus far

A cute woolly alder sawfly (Eriocampa ovata) and a bit of hym on hym violence with a sawfly larva being carried off by an ant (Formica rufa complex)

The first chalcid I was ever able to use my macro lens on and my first wasp galls of the year (ridiculously red compared to all the later ones too) (Cynips divisa)

A nomad bee (Nomada) emerging from, presumably, a mining bee nest (nomad bees parasitise mining bees) which I had noticed and decided to watch for a bit in case anything happened although I hadn't expected much. And also a very scruffy looking Clark's mining bee (Andrena clarkella) that let me get shockingly close to it

A torymid that had just finished parasitising a silk button gall and an ichneumonid larva parasitising a cucumber spider

An ichneumonid visitor to the picnic I had on my birthday, I love her subtle red patterns, and a crabronid I have to include because they're such deeply ridiculous looking animals. They weren't kidding that head can square

Andricus grossulariae and Andricus glandulae galls

My first (and so far only) beewolf (Philanthus triangulum), which are one of my favourite wasps to talk about, they have some really wacky adaptations, and Rhyssella approximator

Sycophila snooping around the oak galls, probably looking for one to parasitise, and a sleepy little nomad bee I spent a while photographing before it started properly waking up

One of my favourite photos ever hands down. I caught this little gall wasp cleaning itself and for a moment it looked like it was standing upright on two legs. Behold a man! And a gorgeous potter wasp (Delta unguiculatum)

A ladybird parasitoid wasp cocoon (Dinocampus coccinellae) and its brainwashed ladybird guard (Harmonia axyridis). Last but certainly not least, two more from this same patch of fennel that was overrun by so many species of wasps, bees and flies – Sphex pruinosus and an emerald cuckoo wasp (Stilbum cyanurum) I just barely caught, which is my profile picture here

YESSS

WEVE GOT:

carpenter bees! (Violet Carpenter bees are all black/purple)

vulture bees! (They eat meat, meat honey is a lie, ignore that part if you search them up, it's just sugary meat paste)

golden browed resin bee!

deaths head hawk moth! (They sneak into beehives and can squeak :D)

Cecropia moth!

Vampire moth!

I don’t know enough about bees to have a favorite bee :((

I like the really big fluffy ones. Those are bumblebees, right?

Beelieve it or not, this blue bee is the real deal! 🐝 Meet the blue carpenter bee (Xylocopa caerulea). This large bee can reach lengths of up to 1.1 in (2.8 cm); compare that to a European honey bee which typically grows up to 0.7 in (1.8 cm) long! Unlike honeybees, this critter doesn’t live in large hives, but instead spends most of its time alone. This insect can be found in parts of India, China, and Southeast Asia where it plays an important role in pollinating its habitat.

THE BEE PICTURED ON THE RIGHT. IS A BUMBLEBEE> WHEREAS THE BEE PICTURED ON THE LEFT. IS A CARPENTER BEE> I AM SICK AND TIRED OF PEOPLE SEEING ONE AND BEING LIKE "Oh look ^_^ a BUMBLEBEE" CAUSE NO IT FUCKING ISNT. AND EVERY TIME I JUST HAVE TO PLAY ALONG

LOOK AT THE BUMBLEBEE? NO THANKS, I DONT THINK I WILL, BECAUSE THATS NOT A FUCKING BUMBLEBEE

ALSO. IDK HOW TO FEEL. BECAUSE I AM DEVELOPING AN OBSESSION WITH BEES. HOWEVER. I AM ALREADY OBSESSED WITH BIRDS. YOU SEE THE ISSUE. I KNOW THAT TECHNICALLY SPEAKING. THAT IS A SEX METAPHOR. I DONT CARE ABOUT SEX THOUGH I ONLY CARE ABOUT BIRDS AND ALSO BEES BUT AS TWO SEPERATE THINGS NOT AS A METAPHOR FOR SEX

I don't know if anyone will see this post, but I think it's worth a try, I hope I don't sound silly (also sorry for bad english!)

So, I really like insects, and I would really want to read something about bees, about their social behaviour, how their insect society works. And I know here on tumblr there are many nerds who are into science. So maybe anyone has a book recommendation?

I don't know if anyone will see this post, but I think it's worth a try, I hope I don't sound silly (also sorry for bad english!)

So, I really like insects, and I would really want to read something about bees, about their social behaviour, how their insect society works. And I know here on tumblr there are many nerds who are into science. So maybe anyone has a book recommendation?

I don't know if anyone will see this post, but I think it's worth a try, I hope I don't sound silly (also sorry for bad english!)

So, I really like insects, and I would really want to read something about bees, about their social behaviour, how their insect society works. And I know here on tumblr there are many nerds who are into science. So maybe anyone has a book recommendation?

I don't know if anyone will see this post, but I think it's worth a try, I hope I don't sound silly (also sorry for bad english!)

So, I really like insects, and I would really want to read something about bees, about their social behaviour, how their insect society works. And I know here on tumblr there are many nerds who are into science. So maybe anyone has a book recommendation?

This doofus fell asleep on a quite deadly place for an insect. Luckily he was noticed!

Pacific digger bee, Anthophora pacifica, Apidae

As the name suggests, digger bees make nests in the soil where larvae develop in cells. They are solitary, though they may nest in large aggregations.