I’m so wrapped up in research about bees at the moment that I keep forgetting to write anything for my blog! So, I’ve decided to double up and write about some of the amazing things I’ve been discovering about bees here in my blog.

I’ll start with the real basics and write a little about the three different types of bees you see in your garden….

Honeybees are ‘eusocial’ bees (meaning that their queen is totally dependant on the rest of the hive to care for her) and live in colonies of between 30,000 and 50,000. These colonies overwinter. The queen lives for around three years, but the workers (infertile females) only live for around three months. The workers clean and maintain and guard the hive, feed the young and gather nectar and pollen. The drones’ (males) primary purpose is to fertilise a new queen and they die immediately after mating. Honeybees can only sting once and then they die.

Bumblebees are ‘quasisocial’ (meaning that the queen can survive on her own) and live in colonies of between 30 and 400 bees. These colonies do not overwinter. The very large bees you are hopefully seeing in your gardens at this time of year will be newly hatched queen bumblebees… possibly ‘Buff Tailed Bees’ (Bombus Terrestris). Later on in the summer it will be the workers you see collecting nectar and pollen whilst the queen remains in the nest laying more eggs. Because they don’t overwinter, bumblebees don’t stockpile honey, so they are only used agriculturally as pollinators. Bumblebees are in serious danger because of loss of habitat and excessive use of pesticides. Of the 25 species of native UK bumblebees, only 6 are still widespread, 7 are in serious decline and 3 are extinct. Bumblebees have no barb in their sting so can sting more than once, but are not aggressive so only sting if they feel threatened.

Solitary bees, as their name suggests, do not form colonies. There are over 250 types of solitary bee in the UK and they are distinguished by the different ways they build their nests. Some dig nests in the ground, whilst others make nests in holes and cracks in buildings or old wood. The Leafcutter bee builds nests by cutting and rolling bits of leaves.  One of the most notable solitary bees is the Mason bee which pollinates our apple orchards. A Mason bee can do the same amount of work in a day as 20 honeybees. Solitary bees have longer pollinating seasons than honeybees and do not sting because they have no honey to protect. My favourite solitary bee is the ‘hairy footed flower bee’!

Bees are our most important pollinators. They are truly amazing and without them we would be in serious trouble. Next time I’ll write a bit about the problems facing bees and what we can do to help.

In case I don’t get around to writing again for the next couple of weeks, I’ll just quickly say now that the biggest thing you can do to help bees is create wildlife friendly gardens…..and plant loads of borage!!!!!!!