Tree bumble bee behaviour

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sooper8

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Jun 8, 2014
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Hi All,

Just joined the forum to find out more about our little colony in a bird box on the side of the house.
It turns out they are tree bumble bees.

One question I would love to know the answer to is this....
There is a bee that flies around outside the entrance literally all day , everyday and sort of intercepts the incoming bees and checks them out in a slightly harassing way.(they seem to 'tumble' around in flight for a while.
First of all, what is he/she doing and is it the same bee everyday or do they take it in turns?

I can only guess as to the purpose , would someone have a definitive answer please?
 
Hi

The bee you're seeing will be a male drone bee hoping to intercept a new unmated queen emerging from the nest,i have a tree bumble nest in my garden and often see drones (sometimes up to 8 at once)circling the nest entrance.The drones have no sting so don't really pose any problem.
 
Bumbles ard not our line on this forum, really. Honey bees are the ones that are keepered. You really need a forum for bumble bees, or a book such as Bumblebees by Ted Benton which is a very comprehensive read.

We help on basics - like re-assuring that bumbles are usually harmless, basic life cycle, etc. Or basic comparisons for identification purposes - it is amazing the low level of general knowlege when it comes to bumbles, honey bees, and wasps; and the myriad of solitary varieties flying around us and not even being noticed by joe public.
 
Hi

The bee you're seeing will be a male drone bee hoping to intercept a new unmated queen emerging from the nest,i have a tree bumble nest in my garden and often see drones (sometimes up to 8 at once)circling the nest entrance.The drones have no sting so don't really pose any problem.

Many thanks!
 
Good luck. My copy has a cover price marking of £45.

Gulp..I'm interested but not that interested

One last question...what are the bees feeding their larvae on , if not honey?
 
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Gulp..I'm interested but not that interested

One last question...what are the bees feeding their larvae on , if not honey?

All bees use pollen as brood food for its pollen content, and nectar is a carbohydrate source. Honeybees (and some stingless bee species) are unique in that they forage huge amounts of nectar and then evaporate water from it to concentrate it, or "ripen" it into honey. The reason being that honey, being far more concentrated than nectar, has a much higher calorie per ml ratio. All bees forage both nectar and pollen as food for themselves and/or their brood. Honeybees use nectar to produce honey.
 
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So do bumblebees! Difference being quantity! Honeybees produce enough to store for the Winter, bumblebees only sufficient for a few days of bad weather !


Sent from my iPad using Tapatalk
 
It's also a question of quantity of foragers.

Average bumblebee nest is 50-200 bees at it's peak.
Average honey bee colony is 50,000 - 80,000 bees at it's peak!!!

My opinion ^^^
 
I suspect bumble bees travel as little as possible. We have 4 x tree bumble nests in our garden: s a maximum 4 x 200 bees. They are all over our garden flowers- esp wild blue geranium and foxgloves..

Impressive noise...
 

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