northeast-flora-and-fauna

Here's another Brown-belted Bumblebee I met last spring. About a decade and a half ago DreamWorks put out a Kung Fu Panda movie; is it time for a Kung Fu Bumblebee movie [1]? And if so, I'd imagine that our own Brown-belted Bumblebee would be a natural for the titular hero who "floats like a butterfly, stings like a bumblebee ". And I'd imagine the Asian Giant Hornet (aka "murder hornet") would be a more than reasonable villain.  Another choice might be a similar bumblebee that just barely includes New Jersey in its range, the Red-belted Bumblebee . Although it doesn't sound like every variety of martial arts recognizes a red belt, apparently kung fu does , where it's considered slightly higher than a brown belt [2]. Regardless of the bumblebee chosen, the star would probably be female since male bumblebees can't sting. I suppose the movie could be about a male bumblebee who, lacking the ability to sting, learns martial arts, but if you...

I have to admit I struggle with bee identification, but this was identified on iNaturalist as a Brown-belted Bumblebee , so that's what I'll talk about. My Bumble Bees of North America book says: Simple keys based on color patterns may appear easy to use and may work well on small local faunas, but they are unreliable for correct identification at the continent-wide level. Not only do bumble bee color patterns often vary a lot within species, but different species can also look similar to one another. The book also states that a lot of important characteristics can only be seen with a microscope or a strong hand lens; the bees I meet generally tolerate my presence but are unlikely to agree to this sort of examination. We'll just have to trust that the iNaturalist identifier knows what they're doing. (I will say the identification sounds plausible .) Despite the name, not all of these bumblebees have a brown band on their abdomens (AKA belts). And unlike with humans, ha...

This is probably an Common Eastern Bumblebee , 1 of our most commonly seen bumblebees, but other bumblebees in the area can look similar, especially the Brown-belted Bumblebee and the Two-spotted Bumblebee . (Presumably the bumblebees have no difficulty distinguishing their species from the others, but IDing them can be tricky for us humans.) I have to admit that the 1st time I saw a bee with those orange blobs [1] on the legs, I wondered whether it was due to disease or some sort of parasite, but it turns out that they are pollen baskets . While "basket" may make you think of a container, bee pollen baskets are basically all pollen shaped into an oval that the bee can carry home. Quite a few bees will use pollen baskets, including honeybees , bumblebees , stingless bees , and orchid bees . My guess is that the presence of pollen baskets suggests that this particular bee had a successful day of pollen foraging. September 7, 2020 at the John Clyde Native Grassland Preserve Ph...