Bees
Osmia californica comes out late in spring, often their emergence overlaps the latter end of the Osmia lignaria (early spring mason bee) season.
However very little is known about them. If you’d like to share your photos of Osmia californica, please email them to me and I will get them on this blog.
Here is an update from researcher Mike
“We would very much appreciate if you could place a request on your blog. Coastal B.C. would be convenient, but we are willing to consider anything. We do have a colleague collecting stylopized Polistes in Eastern U.S.A.; that is where we found the large Colletes aggregation I referred to in my last email. Please don’t hesitate to contact us if you think of anything.”
This researcher would like assistance with locating a ground nesting colony of Andrena bees. (Stylopized bees are parasitized bees). If you have seen any ground nesting bees, please respond to this web. Your help is greatly appreciated. I think he would like the locations to be in the Vancouver region of BC.
Check out the two links below for beautiful photos of various bee species and stylopized bees.
Hello Dr. Margriet Dogterom,
This year I embarked on an project involving the signalling in Strepsipteran parasites of Polistes wasps. Next spring we would like to expand our research to Andrena bees. Ideally, we need to locate large aggregations to provide a ready supply of stylopized bees. We found one large aggregation that turned out to be Colletes, and another that is not very accessible (It’s on a city boulevard).
Ideally we need to locate colonies before emergence next spring, as the stylopized bees emerge first. Would you happen to know the whereabouts of any Andrena bee aggregations?
Thank you,
Mike
I had to go to my old stomping ground to get this article. In 10 years Simon Fraser University did not seem to have changed much- although I did only go to the library. It is a short ride from my home and so tonight I thought to chase up the 1966 article by Levin. I wondered into the library, walked up to the 5th floor and found The Journal of Kansas Entomological Society. Just like that! I spent a lot of my time in amongst these rows and rows of journals. So it was not surprising that I found the green volumes so quickly. Unfortunately there was no volume number 39. I went to information and a kind gentleman looked to see if the library had it hidden from my view. No, but library did have it in digital format. Perfect! It was fairly simple to search for it on the computer and get it printed out. Parking for 55mins was $3.25! But enough about my adventure.
Here is what Levin had to say about Osmia californica. Levin compares Osmia lignaria with Osmia californica. I will focus on the details of Osmia californica.
Osmia californica
-Restricts pollen collection from a few composites
-Does not always overwinter as an adult (lignaria overwinters as an adult)
-About half of 33 overwintering cocoons were prepupae and the remaining half were adult
-Uses a mixture of mud and small amount of leaf tissue (lignaria uses mud only)
-Leaves no vestibule at entrance to nest (lignaria leaves a vestibule)
-Seals last cell with a thicker partition and does not build an end plug
-Buries its egg within the pollen mass (lignaria lays the egg on top of the pollen mass).
I think the most interesting part of this information is that Osmia californica does not always complete their transformation into an adult bee by winter. This means that some bees overwinter as prepupae and complete their development the following spring.
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| Osmia californica cocoons |
