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Bye, Bye 2012
The last honey bee of 2012.
Despite the cold weather at Bodega Bay last Friday, we managed to see a few honey bees nectaring a New Zealand tea tree, aka Leptospermum scoparium.
The temperature registered 53 degrees and there they were, foraging among the dainty pink and white blossoms, as if it were spring.
As the year draws to a close, we've been inundated with words like "fiscal cliff," "spoiler alert," "bucket list" and "YOLO." (No, Yolo doesn't mean Yolo County but "You Only Live Once.")
Let's hope those words don't apply to honey bees in 2013 and the years beyond.
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Diggin' the Bees in Bodega
They can fool you.
Just like replica designer bags, shoes and sunglasses meant to look like the real thing (think Louis Vuitton, Jimmy Choo and Prada), those digger bees on Bodega Head, overlooking Bodega Bay, look like bumble bees.
Especially the females.
Native pollinator specialist Robbin Thorp, emeritus professor of entomology at the University of California, calls them "faux bumble bees."
They're Anthophora bomboides stanfordiana. "The females are the ones that build the neat turrets in front of their nests on the cliff faces," Thorp says. "The females are even better mimics of bumble bees and they do not sting!"
So, if you're visiting Bodega Head to watch the whales, the waves, the birds or the boats, be sure to check out the sand cliffs for the bee villages.
If you want to capture their images, you'll want to lie flat and motionless on the ground, position your trigger finger, and frame them flying in and out of their turrets.
Soon you'll be visiting Bodega Head to see the whales, the waves, the birds, the boats AND the bees.
Female digger bee, Anthophora bomboides stanfordiana, heads for her nest. (Photo by Kathy Keatley Garvey)
Packing pollen, a female digger bee, Anthophora bomboides stanfordiana, crawls into her nest. (Photo by Kathy Keatley Garvey),
Outline of sand cliff with female digger bee heading home. Note the turrets these bees build. (Photo by Kathy Keatley Garvey)
The male digger bee, Anthophora bomboides stanfordiana, looks less like a bumble bee than the female. (Photo by Kathy Keatley Garvey)
Feeding Frenzy on Bodega Head
If you're planning to hike the hills around Bodega Head in Sonoma County, watch out for the bears.
The woolly bear caterpillars, that is.
Last Sunday, with the temperature hovering around 70 degrees, the woolly bears were everywhere. They were munching on the gray-green leaves of Lupinus arboreus (yellow bush lupine), not yet blooming. We also spotted them on yellow mustard and wild radish, both members of the Brassicaceae family and both abloom.
If you look closely at these little caterpillars, they seem to be having a bad hair day. They look as if they just encountered a jolt of static electricity.
They're also known as the larvae of Ranchman's Tiger Moth (Platyprepia virginalis). Once they become moths, they do not resemble woolly bears any more.
Rick Karban, professor of entomology at UC Davis, has published a number of research papers on these herbivores.
"Platyprepia virginalis caterpillars are dietary generalists and feed on multiple host species within a single day," he wrote recently in Ecological Entomology. "We conducted field experiments to evaluate their performance on diets consisting of only their primary food, Lupinus arboreus, or diets consisting of L. arboreus plus other acceptable host species."
"We found that relative growth rates and rates of survival were higher when they fed on mixed diets compared to lupine only."
That feeding behavior we saw, too. A lupine lunch, with a touch of mustard and radish.
Close-up of woolly bear caterpillar on yellow lupine on Bodega Head, Sonoma County. (Photo by Kathy Keatley Garvey)
Woolly bear caterpillar on wild radish on Bodega Head, Sonoma County. (Photo by Kathy Keatley Garvey)
Bumble Bee at Bodega Bay
It's called the "Pride of Madeira" but don't let that name fool you.
True, it's the pride of the Portuguese island of Madeira, where it's endemic, but it's also the joy of Bodega Bay.
"What's that purplish spiked flower that grows somewhat like a yucca or a tower of jewels?" visitors ask. "It's all over the Bodega area."
It's not a yucca, which belongs to the agave family, Agavaceae. It's an Echium candicans, a member of the family Boraginaceae. It's a kissing cousin of Echium wildpretti, or the tower of jewels.
Last Sunday visitors to the Sonoma County coastal town enjoyed the warmth of a spring day and those spectacular blue-to-the-bone-and-purple-as-you-please blooms. An extra bonus: an occasional bumble bee.
Native pollinator specialist Robbin Thorp, emeritus professor of entomology at UC Davis, identified the bumble bee below as Bombus melanopygus.
This little forager found the Pride of Madeira and the Joy of Bodega Bay.
Bombus melanopygus heading toward the Pride of Madeira, Echium candicans. (Photo by Kathy Keatley Garvey)
Peek-a-bee: Bombus melanopygus peers beneath the petals of an Echium candicans, also known as the Pride of Madeira. (Photo by Kathy Keatley Garvey)
Top view of a Bombus melanopygus on an Echium candicans, also known as the Pride of Madeira. (Photo by Kathy Keatley Garvey)
A Yellow Face and Red Saddlebags
The yellow-faced bumble bee (Bombus vosnesenskii) may be one of the most underappreciated pollinators.
You see it buzzing around lavender, lupine, California poppies, mustard and other plants.
But a Xerces Society study of organic farms in Yolo County found that it was one of the most important of the native bees visiting the Sungold cherry tomatoes.
The study, titled “Native Bee Pollination of Cherry Tomatoes,” was based on research by Claire Kremen of UC Berkeley, Neal Williams and Robbin Thorp of UC Davis and Sarah Greenleaf, California State University, Sacramento, all members of Xerces.
“Recent studies demonstrate that tomatoes pollinated by native bees produce larger and more numerous fruits,” the authors wrote. “Honey bees do not pollinate tomatoes because they cannot get the pollen and the flowers do not produce nectar. With no reward, honey bees will not visit the flower. Many native bees, however, know the trick to extracting tomato pollen and are, therefore, valuable pollinators.
"Although the tomato plant is self-fertile, flowers must be vibrated by wind or bees in order to release pollen for fertilization. To achieve the most effective pollination, the flower must be vibrated at a specific frequency to release the pollen. Honey bees are unable to vibrate the tomato flower in this way, but bumble bees and other native species can.
The Xerces Society offers a great resource on how to attract bumble bees: see Farming for Bees: Guidelines for Providing Native Bee Habitat on Farms.
In some respects, the yellow-faced bumble bee resembles a cuddly teddy bear. It's big and bumbly, as a bumble bee should be.
From behind, however, its heavy load of pollen looks for all the world like saddlebags on a trail horse.
Foraging Bumble Bee
Saddlebags
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