Joe Wynne 🌻🚗⛰️Mar 15

Did you ever think you could be important to the survival of a rare, threatened, or endangered species?

👀 Look for an endangered species of insect that lives near you and see if you can help it out.

I'm doing this by growing and eating blueberries. 😋

🐝 Really! There is a type of native bee here that ONLY pollinates blueberry bush flowers like the ones from my garden I photographed below.

🌼 Notice how the flower has a tiny opening at the bottom. Bees who can extract the pollen use specialized high frequency "buzz pollination".

🐝A local bee, the Southeastern Blueberry Bee (Habropoda laboriosa) does this. So, by having blueberry bushes, I help a population of rare pollinators.

💪 You can help populations near you, even if it's just by planting native plants.

📸 One day I hope to capture a photo this bee. It looks like @Da_Gut may have just seen one:
https://dice.camp/@Da_Gut/116233929671304022

#SolarpunkSunday #NativeBees #Bees #Pollinators #BiodiversityGardening #Conservation #Nature #Environment

Show threadDa_GutMar 15
@joewynne oh very neat!
I think I know where they nest… or at least where a bunch of them are investigating as a potential nest spot. There is a tree stump partially out of the ground where a tree fell last year. My brother has cut the tree, but there is a lot of dirt under the root ball.
There were a lot of these bees flying around the underside of the root ball
Show threadJoe Wynne 🌻🚗⛰️

@Da_Gut That's what they do! Nest near the blueberries. I hope you can keep checking on them.

Supposedly they are only active while blueberries are flowering. Not sure what they do after. Hang out in bee bars?

There may be other similar species; I'll have to check.

Mar 15 at 7:30pmWeb
Show threadDa_GutMar 15
@joewynne they probably die. There are a lot of insects that are active for a very short time frame frames. Plants too, most of the spring ephemerals. The trees are starting to leaf out, so they’ll probably vanish for another year.