Bee Diversity

Globally, there are more than 20,500 described species of bees, 4,000 of which are native to North America, and it is estimated that there are over 800 different bee species in Canada.

Bees are responsible for pollinating more than 250,000 species of flowering plants. Everyone loves the sweet taste of honey that is produced by honey bees. However, bees are even more important and extremely beneficial to humans because of their pollination services. We rely on pollinators for increased yields in agriculture, estimated to be worth $200 billion in food crop production each year. Maintaining diverse and healthy bee communities is essential to sustaining our ecosystems.

Below you will find information on the five local bee families and a representation of the diversity found broadly across eastern North America.

Bee Families

Andrenidae: A very large family of bees. Most bees are solitary ground nesters

Mining Bee (Andrena)

· Nesting Habitat: Ground nesters favoring sandy soil around shrubs.

· Social Behaviour: Most are solitary, though often nesting in aggregations. A few species nest communally, but still build and provide for their own brood cells individually.

· Floral preferences: Includes both generalist and specialist species. Some of these specialists collect nectar from only one flower (monolectic) such as Cammissonia ovate (goldeneggs) or Oenothera (evening primrose).

· Known to forage on: Butterfly weed, milkweed, nipplewort, eastern purple coneflower, smooth oxeye, common bird's-foot-trefoil, Canadian goldenrod, Italian clover, white clover, dandelion, other clovers, and veches

Mining Bee (Calliopsis)

· Nesting Habitat: Short soil burrows

· Social Behaviour: Solitary

· Floral Preferences: Many species are oligolectic (specialists)

· Known to forage on: Canadian goldenrod, white clover, and other clovers

Miner Bee (Protandrena)

· Nesting Habitat: Ground

· Social Behaviour: Solitary

· Known to forge on: Black-Eyed Susan

Apidae: One of the most well known family of bees. This bee family includes honey bees, bumble bees, carpenter bees and many more

Digger Bee (Anthophora)

· Nesting Habitat: Soil of banks or flat ground

· Social Behaviour: Solitary

· Known to forage on: Blue giant hyssop, eastern purple coneflower, iron weed

Honey Bee (Apis mellifera) *non-native, European bees

· Nesting Habitat: Make perennial nests of wax produced and shaped by worker bees, in which honey is stored

· Social Behaviour: Eusocial, with perennial colonies consisting of one queen be, a fertile female, up to several thousand drone bees (fertile males), and a variable number of sterile female worker bees

· Floral Preferences: Generalists, but do not pollinate all plants. This species has been used for most of the commercial pollination of crops

Bumble Bee (Bombus)

· Nesting Habitat: Found in ground tunnels made other animals or in tussock grass

· Social Behaviour: Social with colonies consisting of one queen and fewer than,
fifty bees total per nest. Colonies only last for one season in most species.

· Floral Preferences: Generalist; display floral consistency, visiting same patches of flowers daily; and will travel 1-2 kilometers from their colonies to collect pollen.

· Known to forage on: Blue giant hyssop, butterfly weed, milkweed, brown knapweed, wild carrot, eastern purple coneflower, buckwheat, smooth oxeye, sunflower species, common bird's-foot-trefoil, honeysuckles, lupin, wild bergamont, sulphur cinquefoil, black-eyed Susan, Canadian goldenrod, broadleaf arrowhead, saltmedow cordgrass, gloxinia, red clover, dandelion, and ironweed

Small Carpenter Bee (Ceratina)

· Nesting Habitat: Stems of dead broken pithy plants

· Social Behaviour: Many solitary, but some species are subsocial or form weak eusocial colonies

· Floral Preferences: Generalists

Long-Horned Bee (Melissodes)

· Nesting Habitat: Ground burrows with brood cells lined in a wax-like material secreted by female bees

· Social Behaviour: Generally solitary, though some species nest in aggregations

· Known to forge on: Sunflower and coneflower species

Cuckoo Bee (Nomada)

· Nesting Habitat: Lay eggs in the nests of other species, esp. of genus Andrena

· Social Behaviour: Cleptoparasitic

· Floral Preference: Generalist

Large Carpenter Bee (Xylocopa)

· Nesting Habitat: Burrows in dead wood, bamboo, or structural timbers (expect for ground-nesting subgenus Proxylocopa)

· Social Behaviour: Mostly solitary, but some species have simple social nests

· Floral Preferences: Generalists, but important pollinators of open-faced flowers

· Known to forge on: Blue giant hyssop, buckwheat, lupin, wild bergamont, rose species, Canadian goldenrod, gloxinia, dandelion, and iron weed

Colletidae: A family of solitary bees made up of 2500 discovered species. Many species are give semi-solid pollen balls to their young

Plasterer Bee (Colletes)

· Nesting Habitat: Underground nests lined with a natural polyester, cellophane-like plastic secretion

· Social Behaviour: Solitary, but sometimes nest in aggregations

Yellow Masked Bee (Hylaeus)

· Nesting Habitat: Dead twigs or plant stems

· Social Behaviour: Solitary

· Floral Preferences: Generalists

· Known to forge on: Canadian goldenrod and a species in the rose family

Halictidae: Commonly referred to as sweat bees due to their attractiveness to perspiration. Most species live in the ground but some are found nesting in wood

Sweat Bee (Agapostemon)

· Nesting Habitat: Dig deep burrows in banks and other areas of flat or sloping soil

· Social Behaviour: Most species are solitary; however, some nest communally with up to twenty-four females sharing one nest entrance, but each female builds and provides for her own cluster of brood cells inside.

· Floral Preferences: Generalist, though their short tongues make extracting nectar from deep flowers difficult

· Known to forage on: Butterfly weed, smooth oxeye, hawkweed, common bird's-foot-trefoil, sulphur cinquefoil, black-eyed Susan, coneflowers, saltmedow cordgrass, gloxinia, and white clover

  Sweat Bee (Augochlorella)

·  Nesting Habitat: Ground

·  Social Behaviour: Eusocial

· Known to forge on: Honeysuckle, black-eyed Susan, broadleaf arrowhead, and ironweed

Sweat Bee (Augochloropsis)

· Nesting Habitat: Ground nesters

· Social Behaviour: Semisocial

· Known to forage on: Buttercups and veches

Sweat Bee (Augochlora)

· Social Behaviour: Solitary

· Nesting Habitat: Burrows into wood

Sweat Bee (Dufourea)

· Nesting Habitat: Shallow ground nests

· Social Behaviour: Solitary

· Flower Preferences: Specialists (esp. Linanthus, Eschscholzia, Clarkia, Oenothera, Helianthus, Campanula, Calochortus, Monarda, Phacelia, Cryptantha, Mimulus, Cacataceae)

Sweat Bee (Halictus)

· Nesting Habitat: Underground burrows

· Social Behaviour: Mostly eusocial with colonies ranging from 2 to over 200 bees

· Floral Preferences: Generalists

· Known to forage on: Blue giant hyssop, butterfly weed, milkweed, brown knapweed, cigar flower, wild carrot, skevish, eastern purple coneflower, buckwheat, sunflower species, hawkweed, lupin, wild bergamont, sulphur cinquefoil, black-eyed Susan, buttercups, coneflowers, Canadian goldenrod, saltmedow cordgrass, gloxinia, white clover, and ironweed

Sweat Bee (Lasioglossum)

· Nesting Habitat: most are ground nesters, but a few species reside in rotten logs

· Social Behaviour: Varies widely, including solitary, communal, semisocial, primitively eusocial, and socially parasitic species

· Floral Preferences: Generalist

· Known to forage on: Blue giant hyssop , butterfly weed,, nipplewort, wild carrot, eastern purple coneflower, sunflower species, hawkweed, sulphur cinquefoil, buttercups, coneflowers broadleaf arrowhead, lilac, white clover, clover, iron weed

Cuckoo Bee (Sphecodes)

· Nesting Behaviour: lay eggs in nests of other species esp. Halictus and Lasioglossum

· Social Behaviour: Cleptoparasitic

Megachilidae: Most species carry collected pollen on their abdomen. These bees are extremely efficient pollinators due to their pollen collection method and the high number of flower visits

Leaf-Cutter Bee (Anthidiellum)

· Nesting Habitat: Nests constructed of cells of resin on stems, leaves, and rocks

· Social Behaviour: Solitary

· Known to forage on: Common bird's-foot-trefoil

Mason Bees (Anthidium)

· Nesting Habitat: Build nests from a mix of conifer resin, plant hairs, and/or mud

· Social Behaviour: Most species solitary

· Floral Preferences: Generalist, with some species acting as robber bees taking food from other bees

· Known to forage on: Common bird's-foot-trefoil

Cuckoo-Leaf-Cutter Bees (Coelioxys)

· Nesting Habitat: Do not make nests, instead lay eggs inside the nests of other bees instead

· Social Behaviour: Parasitic

· Floral Preferences: Generalist

Leaf-Cutter Bee (Megachile)

· Nesting Habitat: Built in hollow twigs and other natural cavities and lined with chewed leaves or petals

· Social Behaviour: Solitary

· Known to forage on: sunflower and coneflower species

Mason Bee (Heriades)

· Nesting Habitat: Nest in ground burrows and twigs

· Social Behaviour: Solitary

· Floral Preference: Generalist

· Known to feed on: clover

Mason Bee (Hoplitis)

· Nesting Habitat: Diverse among species, including in pithy steams with leaf pulp and/or pebbles, holes in wood, holes in bank soil made by other insects, short soil burrows, and nests built of pebbles, soil, and saliva

· Social Behaviour: Solitary

· Known to forage on: blue giant hyssop

Mason Bee (Osmia)

· Nesting Habitat: Varies, including burrows in soil and hollow stems sometimes with clay and other material for cell walls

· Social Behaviour: Solitary

· Floral Preferences: Frequently visit Vaccinium, shrubs producing fruit such as blueberry and cranberry bushes

· Known to forage on: Clover

Cuckoo Bee (Stelis)

· Nesting Habitat: Lay eggs in nests of other species of leaf-cutters (Megachile)

· Social Behaviour: Cleptoparasitic