The Right Sort of Bees

[Robson Valley]

Bees, ants, wasps and so forth are the Order Hymenoptera (membrane wings).
Flies are in the Order Diptera (two wings).

Here, we have several species of solitary bees. They are about the same size, but gray not orange abdomens, which are the introduced honey bee of commerce.
Far and away larger are our native bumble bees which live in small social colonies. Adult queens can be 4cm in length = they are huge things. Workers 3cm or less.
Those are black and yellow. My insect ID book identifies them as Megabombus pennsylvanicus.

There are smaller species of what we also call bumble bees, these are yellow, black and very distinctly bright orange abdomens.
The book is silent on the proper name but I could find it elsewhere.

 

[ValeTudoGuy]

Theres 20 odd types of Bumblebee in the uk and only 1 type of Honeybee.

I see Bumblebees nesting in compost bins, Rabbit Hutches, Old Car parts... Basically anything close to the ground, almost every year. They dont seem to mind people being around and there tends to be 10-20 of them bumbling about at a time.

I'm sometimes lucky enough to see a wild Honey Bee hive.. A handfull of times in my 33 years, we had one at work one year. I have only ever seen them in hollow trees... Though I am sure they may build in other places like rarely used sheds etc.

They normally have a LOT more Bee's hanging around and in my admittedly limited experience are no where near as tolerant of people. In all hosesty, Honey Bee hives are one of the few things in British nature that has really properly scared me. Completely my own fault for being too brave and curious.

 

[Robson Valley]

Other than the bumble bee "nests," the closest thing here to a wild hive is the paper construction made by the yellow & black "Yellowjacket" wasps
and the slightly larger, black & white "Bald-faced Hornet. Unless you have an absolutley clear plan to kill them all, and quickly, they will find you.
With stinging, they release pheromones to tells the others to "come and sting."
1. They cannot survive the ride down the corrugated hose of a ShopVac vauum cleaner. Normally go into the tank as 2 or 3 pieces.
2. They all go home at night. Suck up what you can for a couple of days with the ShopVac. If you can see the paper nest, after dark, quietly approach
and with the tube spout, inject WD-40 as you count to 5 then run like Hello.

 

[Toddy]

I'm with ValeTudoGuy on the bees too.

Wasps ? s'easy. You buy the white powder wasp killer stuff and sprinkle it where they are getting into the area where they have their byke. The returning wasps brush against it and carry it into the byke. In a day or so, they're all dead. It's under three quid for the plastic puffer bottle which does several bykes.

M

 

[Janne]

The only flying insects I used to be happy killing was Hornets? Only when our son was young though. Before and now - Live and let live.
All have a function in nature.

 

[santaman2000]

...... In all hosesty, Honey Bee hives are one of the few things in British nature that has really properly scared me. Completely my own fault for being too brave and curious.

Unless the bees are Africanized I'm really more scared by yellow jackets https://youtu.be/gaK_g_d81Hc It's really east to overlook them until after you've run over the hole with the lawn mower. Or back when I was logging as a teenager. The sawyer would cut down the tree (the nest near the base of the stump would be dazed by the fumes from the saw and he'd never even see them) Then I'd back the tractor up to it and they'd attack me when I dismounted to hook to the log to bring it to the loading area.

 

[Robson Valley]

When your kid gets stung in the throat by a hornet, your attitude will be corrected.
******* went into a can of fizzy soft drink. I've never let one live since then.
Me and another guy were drilling holes for the posts for a short (24") retaining wall.
The machine must have gone dead-center into a wasp ground nest.
Got the machine and got away. Gasoline and a match the next day. Dirt burns really well.

The issue is the untold variety of agricultural crops pollinated by the commercialized, large colony, European honey bee.
If you are unfamiliar with the impact, look it up. Active enough that we can steal their honey (foood reserves) and wax.
Neat to watch how calm the bees are when the hives are attended to by knowledgable bee-keepers.

Colony Collapse Disorder is contributing to our food-safety risks.
This isn't Chicken-Little, screaming: "the sky is falling, the sky is falling."

 

[slowworm]

To answer the original question I wouldn't have thought they are honey bees as there would be 1,000s of them at this time of year. A small swarm 10,000, normal swarm 20,000+ and a colony 40,000+ at this time of year.

They younger workers also orientate when it's warm so you should see quite a few bees flying near the entrance (100+). You should also have larger and plumper drones flying about.

Not all worker honey bees look the same, ours are a good mix of the various sub-species and range in size and colour, from small mostly black bees to larger very orangy/yellow stripy bees.

Colonies also behave differently, some can be very gentle and will not attack, others can attack at the slightest provocation. I've also found they get a bit more protective in autumn/winter - probably protecting their stores.

 

[daveO]

Tree bumblebees are getting very common around here now. I've had them nesting in my composter, in bird boxes, tree cavities, in the eaves of the house, they're not fussy about where they nest and even go in people's tumble driers apparently. As they're an invasive species I'm not sure how welcome I should make them but they seem harmless enough.

 

[Janne]

Bumblebees invasive species?

 

[Robson Valley]

How very very interesting. Any pollinator is better than none.

https://bumblebeeconservation.org/images/uploads/Tree_bee_article_2015.pdf

 

[acheter]

They are about the same size, but gray not orange abdomens, which are the introduced honey bee of commerce.