Wild Sprout 2018 Pollinators

Pollinator Chart

Here are our primary pollinators, along with my attempt to describe the differences of what is generally referred to as “bees.” Actually, we have bees and wasps in our farm helping us with the crop.

Common Name	Honey Bee	Bumble Bee	Yellow Jacket (wasp)	Bald-faced Hornet (wasp)
Scientific Name	Apis Mellifera	Bombus vosnesenskii (yellow-face)	Vespula vularis	Dolichovespula maculata
Image
Appearance	Short, thick body covered with hair. Delicate wings, most often yellow dominates black stripes	Fuzzy (almost fluffy) insects with short, stubby wings	Long and thin, dangling legs, two pairs of long thin wings. Smooth body and legs	Black with ivory pattern lines. Queen is hairless; workers appear to have smooth body and legs
Size	9 mm to 20 mm	9 mm to 18 mm	12mm to 16 mm	Adult: ¾ inch; 12mm to 20 mm
Legs	Flat and wide	Flat and wide	Round and waxy	wiry
Abdomen & thorax	Round	Round/bulbous	Cylindrical	Long and narrow
Kingdom	Animalia	Animalia	Animalia	Animalia
Phylum	Arthropoda	Arthropoda	Arthropoda	Arthropoda
Class	Insecta	Insecta	Insecta	Insecta
Order	Hymenoptera	Hymenoptera	Hymenoptera	Hymenoptera
Family	Apidae	Apidae	Vespidae	Vespidae
Genus	Apis	Bombus	Vespula	Dolichvespula
Species	Mellifera	ternarius	Vulgaris	maculata
Aggressiveness	Honey bees are social and generally considered mild-tempered	Generally considered mild tempered	Aggressive	Aggressive
Feeding	Pollen and nectar	Pollen and nectar	Omnivorous. Varies among species, includes nectar and fruit or flowers; preyed or scavenged insects
Nesting	Hexagonal wax comb, built buy workers. Hive generally in tree hollows or rock gaps/holes	Queen builds wax cells clustered (not hexagonal like honey bees). Hive generally close to ground under piles of wood, dead leaves; nest lined with honeypots	Paper-like nest. Usually outside in trees, shrubs, or under eves and decks	Paper-like nest. Aerial nest up to 10 inches (or larger) in diameter
Colony size	20000 – 80000 individuals	50 to 500 individuals	2000-4000 individuals	400 individuals
Eggs	Laid in comb; fed by nurse bees first with royal jelly and then honey and pollen (bee bread)	Laid in comb; fed by queen initially, then workers take over	Laid in comb; queen feeds shredded insects
Sting	Barbed stingers	Barbless stingers, repeat stings	Barbless stingers, repeat stings
Favorite flowers (observed)	Thyme, raspberries, radish, oregano, sweet mint, mustard, sun flowers, cosmos, clover	Marionberries, raspberries	Observed beginning mid-August hovering under honey bee hives; not observed on any flower/blossom	Observed beginning mid-August primarily on raspberries. They did not seem to bother honey bees however the one-and-only- picture I have is one sneaking into our weak hive

It’s hard taking pictures of bees. Perhaps that’s obvious to everyone, but now I really know it. I need to work on taking more pictures of pollinators other than honey bees.