Bees

Watching bees in the garden is fascinating. There are many different sorts and not at all easy to identify. The red-tailed bumble-bee nests behind the grid in the wall below the kitchen floor and the white-tailed bumble-bee nests in the roof above my bedroom window. There are mason bees in cardboard tubes above the car port and a leaf-cutter bee has a tunnel in a plant pot in the greenhouse. It lines the tunnel with segments of leaves that it neatly cuts and carries.




The phlomis is an excellent bee plant and I do like to watch the bees land on the lower petal and push their way into the flower. Then as they do, the flower gets its reward as the stamens bend down and press the anthers onto the bee's furry back leaving a dusting of pollen. Off the bee flies to another flower where it will leave a trace of male pollen on the female stigma and so fertilise it and enable seeds to form. Simply wonderful!