Apidae – Carpenter bees, Squash bees, Blueberry bees, Cuckoo bees

THE APIDAE FAMILY: CARPENTER, SQUASH, AND CUCKOO BEES

Besides the Bumblebee, the Apidae family houses the Carpenter bee, Squash bee, Southeastern Blueberry bee, and Cuckoo bee. 

CARPENTER BEES(Xylocopa virginica)

Characteristics

Typical characteristics of the carpenter bee: 

  • Fairly large in size and black
  • A nearly hairless abdomen(similar to the bumblebee), which makes this area appear glossy.

Behavior

Female carpenter bees excavate wide tunnel systems in wood where they build their nests, often to the chagrin of homeowners. As well as being considered a bit of a rogue because of their tendency to bore into window trim, they are also known for their non-conventional foraging. 

Occasionally, when visiting long tubular flowers, female carpenter bees will “rob” the nectar by slitting the flower at the base, taking the nectar and circumventing the pollen-covered anthers and the stigmas. 

In Your Pollinator Garden

Carpenter bees can be found in high numbers in Metro Atlanta gardens. In early spring, male bees often “patrol” promising mating sites, chasing away any other males, and in the process, cause some alarm to human gardeners sharing their environment. Although they may appear to be viciously dive-bombing your guests as you take them on a stroll of your new greenspace, they cannot sting. 

Don’t be perturbed by their bad rap:

Carpenter bees are an important native pollinator. You can have a lovely intact wooden porch and also harbor a nice garden with carpenter bee pollinators present. 

Building carpenter bee boxes will allow for a nesting site that is amenable to bee and human. The best part about installing one of these beauties is that carpenter bees will often return to the exact same nest year after year. So, once the bees have established a nest inside your man-made nesting box, they will stay in the bee box and not in your house. 

 

Photo Credit: Radfotosonn(Pixabay)

bee hotel 8

Photo Credit: Sabinem34(Pixabay)

SQUASH BEES(Peponapis pruinosa)

Characteristics

  • Size is comparable to the standard honey bee, though, they may be slightly larger(up to 0.6 inches in length)
  •  Hardy in appearance
  • Females have exceptionally “fuzzy” hind legs to aid in pollen collection
  • Males may have a distinctive yellow spot on their face

Behavior

Squash bees are extremely efficient at pollinating:

  • Squash
  • Pumpkins
  • Cucurbits(many types of gourds are in this category)

Their success with these specific species is due to their “work schedules” that are finely tuned to the daily rhythms of the cucurbit flower. The squash bee arrives to forage early when the flower opens, gathers the nectar and pollen, and then departs from the flower just as fast.

As underground nesters, these bees will often reside under the very plants in which they pollinate. They prefer to tunnel in high, well-drained bare soil, and can also be found under rocks or other objects. The key to keeping happy squash bees is to not disturb nesting sites, as they will return each year and form large nest aggregations. 

 

In Your Pollinator Garden

You will likely only see the squash bee if you have included members of the cucurbit family. While this be is found in Georgia, its prevalence in an urban setting is limited to larger spaces of land with some form of agriculture; otherwise, they are mostly found in the mountains, out toward the coast, or in flatwoods with shallow water tables. 

The squash bee has also been shown to correlate heavily with regions that have a high level of cucurbit agriculture. Ultimately, the distribution of squash bees has shown to adapt to new regions when cucurbit agriculture has expanded into other areas. Therefore, increasing the awareness of these native pollinators may help to increase the number of pollinator-based gardens in the urban and outer Metro Atlanta areas that include agricultural species. Raising awareness also helps to discuss ethical management issues for native squash bees and their presence in the agricultural industry. 

Photo Credit: USDA-ARS Bee Biology and Systematics Lab

GAPPS GOAL FOR SQUASH BEES

GAPP’s goal to incorporate green space within a 25-mile radius around Metro Atlanta would lend itself to the possibility of including farmlets and coop farm groups located on the border or outer rim of the interest area. Areas like this should definitely support programs that focus on conservation efforts to attract this type of pollinator. This would also be a great species to encourage visitation in community food gardens. 

Photo Credit: USDA-ARS Bee Biology and Systematics Lab

SOUTHEASTERN BLUEBERRY BEES(Habropoda laboriosa)

Characteristics

  • Size ranges anywhere from 0.5 inches – 0.62 inches with females landing on the larger side
  •  Unlike others in the Apidae family, their abdomen is black
  •  Unlike others in the Apidae family, their abdomen is black without any yellow stripes present

Behavior

Female bees of the species use sonication or “buzz pollination” when visiting flowers. They attach themselves lightly to the flower and vibrate their flight muscles to shake or dislodge the pollen from the anther onto the bee. The next flower that is visited gets the same treatment, except this time the old pollen gets shaken off onto the stigma and new pollen is deposited back onto the bee and so forth and so on. 

By using “buzz pollination,” the southeastern blueberry bee leads to a handling rate 3 times faster than a comparative Bombus species. 

In Your Pollinator Garden

The majority of large-scale blueberry agriculture in Georgia will lie outside of the GAPP garden radius, and therefore dictates a natural correlation that there will be minimal numbers of Habropoda laboriosa found in urban pollinator gardens. 

If a southeastern blueberry bee were to visit your garden, it will only do so for a couple of weeks a year. Do you want to take a guess what weeks those are?

That’s right, the exact same week that blueberries are in flower. Talk about specific pollinator and flower interactions. This pollinator relationship was built to last. 

 

Photo Credit: Blair Sampson(Image found on the Tallahassee blog website)

Photo Credit: USDA Forest Service

CUCKOO BEES(Nomadinae subfamily)

Characteristics

The group Nomadina, within the Apidae family, is made up of exclusively parasitic bees. At last count, over 795 species have been identified worldwide. 

Physical Characteristics: 

  • Nearly hairless(no need for fluffy hair Bombus style) 
  • Wasp-like in appearance
  • Red or yellow with whitish markings 
  • Smokey wings or wingtips

Behavior

Cuckoo bees are named because of their parasitic egg-laying behavior. The females of the group will lay her eggs in the nest of another bee reminiscent of the behavior of a cuckoo bird. In general, when the cuckoo bee larvae hatch, they consume the host larvae’s pollen ball and then, if it was not already undertaken by the egg-laying “mother,” the larvae will then eat the host larvae as well. 

In other cases, if the host species is social, the cuckoo bee will remain in the host’s nest, laying eggs and sometimes even killing the queen and adopting the role for herself. 

Because of this parasite behavior, cuckoo bees have lost the adaptation to carry pollen as it is not a function that they must carry out. Rather, the pollen is taken from the host’s nest. 

In Your Pollinator Garden

Records for the range for this type of bee are scarce in Georgia. Some records indicate that specimens have been found in Savannah and Athens and populate the state from February through May. However, it is well known that many cuckoo bees parasitize the nests of bees in the family Andrenidae, and species from this family are recorded as present in Georgia. 

Photo Credit: Skeeze(Pixabay)

Photo Credit: Skeeze(Pixabay)

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