So this morning I did my every other day morning bee check. Took Buddy out with me and I am down looking at the squash hoping to spot a squash bee and I hear the ubiquitous "Whassat Daddy", look up and my son is about to get ahold of this guy:
Not sure what kind of bee it is, but its about 2 inches long. Sent a photo off to U of I to get some help identifying it. Buddy was trying to pick it up, so I stopped him and grabbed the camera. Then I continued my tour out front and LO AND BEHOLD the BEES HAVE ARRIVED! Here is my first official spotting of a honey bee, they are all over my Delphiniums! Now I have to figure out how to get them to move to my tomatoes.
There are actually a whole bunch of different types of bees out there including some paper wasps, honey bees, a couple of different bumble bees, etc. Now I just need my beloved squash bees to come back!
i play bee to my tomatoes by putting my finger in one tomato flower then another to speed up fruit development - is this natural, lol - glad to meet another organic gardener - peace for all
ReplyDeleteJust catching up on your blog, and noticed your bees. The bottom one is definitely a honey bee, but the top one may actually be a Syriphid Fly. They sometimes look like bumble bees or carpenter bees. There's a great site called bugguide.net where you can post your picture for identification. The site is run at Iowa State, but bug nerds from all over North America help to ID the photos.
ReplyDeleteI found a similar looking bumble bee-look-a-like, really a member of the Syriphid Fly family, you can see it here: http://bugguide.net/node/view/316286 The Syriphids are good pollinators, adults live on pollen and nectar. The larva are sometimes predators, some eat aphids, and others, like the one I found above, prey on bumble bee larva.
You can tell I'm a bit of a bug nerd myself! ;)