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All about solitary bees in your garden - miners, masons, white-faced,
wool carders and more |
HAIRY FOOTED FLOWER BEES IN SHROPSHIRE
- SURVEY
Have you seen Hairy Footed Flower Bees in your garden?
Find out about Hairy Footed Flower Bees
here
Contact the Shropshire Bee Survey
here |
What are solitary
bees?
Mention bees and most people think of the 'social bees' - swarms of honey bees, or gangs of
bumblebees. In fact, the vast majority of bees are
solitary, living out their lives as single bees, provisioning single nest
cells, rather than working with many other bees to raise huge numbers of
offspring in shared nests. Find out more here:
solitary bees
Above: Red Mason Bee
How do I attract solitary bees to my
garden?
It's pretty easy to attract
solitary bees to your garden. Many species may already be present. To find
out more go to the
Homes for Solitary Bees page. |
Above: Andrena nigroeana on Aubretia flowers
How many species of solitary bee are
there?
There are around 250 different
species of solitary bee in Britain. A surprising number of solitary bees
occur in gardens. A few simple actions can help a wide range of these
wonderful creatures to survive in and around your garden.
Are solitary bees interesting?
You bet they are!
There are mason bees, leafcutters, mining bees, white faced bees, carder
bees, cuckoo bees and loads more. Many have fascinating life histories,
and repay close study with hours of enjoyment watching their activities
around the garden.
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What use are solitary bees?
Many solitary bees are very
efficient pollinators. In the USA, bees of the genus Osmia, known as
orchard bees, are used for pollinating fruit trees. Find out more here:
Orchard Bees. Also,
a leafcutter bee is used to pollinate Alfalfa crops in North America and
Australia. Find out more here:
Alfalfa Bees.
It's very likely that solitary bees are
important for the pollination of many plants. Some species are quite
specialized and have close connections with certain types of plants.
Do solitary bees sting?
Yes, they can, but here's the good news:
Only the females sting and they have feeble stings. They will only attempt
to sting you if roughly handled. Solitary bees live solitary
life-styles, so they do not gang up on you in terrifying numbers. In fact they
don't gang up on you at all. They hardly bother to defend their own
nests! In short, they are virtually harmless. |
Do solitary bees have any enemies?
They do. There's a host of
critters all trying to muscle in and take advantage of the bees' hard
work. The great thing is that these are mostly pretty amazing insects too.
Watch out for cuckoo wasps, cuckoo bees and ichneumon wasps, that all have
amazing ways of exploiting solitary bee nests. |
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Left,
an ichneumon wasp - a kind of parasitic wasp. One of many enemies of solitary
bees. This one is busy laying its egg in the nest of a leafcutter bee.
Read more about
the freeloaders that live at the expense of solitary bees:
Freeloaders |
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Web design, photos and content by
Nigel Jones Optimised for
800 x 600 resolution |
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