#striped nomia sweat bee

[onenicebugperday]

Striped Nomia sweat bee, Nomia strigata, Halictidae

Photographed in Singapore by budak

[bestanimal]

:ooo do you have a favorite hymenopteran? im fond of the velvet ant, since i saw so many while i was at my last job

It’s hard to narrow it down to just one favorite (we’ll see if I have to do that in this tournament lol), but tbh I am really fond of a lot of wasps, mostly Apoidea. I love Eastern Cicada Killers (Sphecius speciosus) and a lot of the other big guys like the Steel-blue Cricket-hunter (Chlorion aerarium) and Great Black Digger Wasp (Sphex pensylvanicus) are always fun to see in the wild. I love sweat bees too, especially the green ones. One I added to my collection last Summer that I found really beautiful was the Norton’s Nomia (Nomia nortoni) which has pearlescent stripes???

But yeah Velvet Ants are also a great pick, I love seeing them. I saw a male Eastern Velvet Ant (Dasymutilla occidentalis) for the first time this Summer and was really bummed I didn’t have my net with me. (I collect only one male and female of each species.) He had beautiful metallic blue wings. I also used to have 2 pet velvet ants that lived with my death-feigning beetles. Their names were Bambi and Cupcake. 😅

The thing with Hymenopterans is that they’re just so incredibly diverse that it’s hard to pick just one, and that’s one of the reasons I love them so much! And you don’t even have to travel far to see cool ones; there’s a huge diversity of them right in your backyard. I am sitting on the back porch right now watching a Potter Wasp and and Carpenter Bee pollinate my Heuchera.

Photos, cause I guess this can double as Arthropod propaganda, not that it needs it lol:

Eastern Cicada Killer (Sphecius speciosus) (own work)

Steel-blue Cricket-hunter (Chlorion aerarium) (source)

Great Black Digger Wasp (Sphex pensylvanicus) (source)

Pure Green Sweat Bee (Augochlora pura) (source)

Norton’s Nomia (Nomia nortoni) (source)

Eastern Velvet Ant (Dasymutilla occidentalis) (female, but there is also a photo of a male in the source)

Sacken’s Velvet Ant (Dasymutilla sackenii) (this is what Bambi was, but I don’t remember what exact species Cupcake was) (source)

[official-bee-posts]

Official bee post!! 🐝 🐝 🐝

Striped Nomia sweat bee, Nomia strigata, Halictidae

Photographed in Singapore by budak