More about Bees

I remain thoroughly fascinated by bees.  I came across this lovely plate on google Reader the other day, and wanted to share it here:

Field book of insects

New York,G.P. Putnam's sons,1918.biodiversitylibrary.org/item/17499

Very pretty bit of work, isn't it?   I've been hoping to get a picture of some of the bees/wasps that have built a nest in the rock wall near my driveway.  I haven't managed to get a good enough look at them to identify them well.  They could be a variety of mining or digging bee or ground nesting wasp.  They are on the fuzzy side, but have never been aggressive, are not terribly numerous, and similar in size to a honeybee.  I confess to having been very lax in pruning or pulling a lot of the late flowering Aster weeds in the yard, because I continued to see bees visiting them until it turned cold.  Given the continuing bad news for bees, I've been reluctant to deny the locals a food source, even if it doesn't look like much. 

If you're interested in bees, here are two guides produced by the Forest Service that can provide you with  more info.

The beautifully illustrated Bee Basics:  http://www.fs.fed.us/wildflowers/pollinators/documents/BeeBasics.pdf

And the more rigorous (and narrow) Bumble Bees of the Eastern US:  http://www.fs.fed.us/wildflowers/pollinators/documents/BumbleBeeGuide2011.pdf