Female Hairy-footed flower bee foraging on lungwort
At first glance, the all black female hairy-footed flower bee (Anthophora plumipes) can easily be mistaken for a queen bumblebee in the early spring, albeit she is somewhat smaller, has orange hairs on her hind legs and lacks the usual yellow or white bands of some bumblebee queens that forage around the same time and even on some of the same plants. Lungwort (Pulmonaria officianalis) flowers are well known hairy-footed flower bee magnets. Being bell-shaped flowers, only long-tongued bees can access the nectar and this bee has a visibly long tongue which on many occasions I noticed they flew around without retracting it under their bodies. I watched several of these females, hovering around the flowers, with their high pitched buzzing sounds and quick darting flight, they are easily missed if trying to film! Lungwort is also popular with the ginger coloured bumblebee Bombus pascuorum which are now regular feeders on this plant in my garden. They look vaguely similar to male Hairy-footed flower bees.
B. pascuorum also uses lungwort
Males
Males are so distinctly different with light golden brown body hairs, fair ‘moustaches’ and long bristles on their middle legs, hence their name.
Solitary bees
Although resembling bumblebees, they are in fact solitary bees that will live in larger communities, if conditions are right for them. They remain solitary even in larger nest site communities, as they will nest gregariously, in clay slopes and steep walls of mud. They may also nest inside soft mortar of brick walls. I have never myself found a nest site, even though they are common in the UK and I have not seen any such bees in any of my gardens.
Provide flowers
To get into my garden, a plant has to ‘earn its place’ and provide something for wildlife. Then I will provide it with a new home! I bought several of the Victoria Brooch species of pulmonaria that the bees were using at the garden centre and they have a new home! According to BWARS, planting Aubrieta, Azalea, Borage, cabbage, daffodils, gorse, ground ivy, herb-robert, ivy-leaf toadflax, primrose, Rosemary, violets, wallflowers and of course lungworts all of which are used by these bees.
Hope you enjoy the video which shows a female clearly cleaning her tongue (proboscis) (in slow motion) several times with her front legs after feeding, and possibly removing pollen grains and putting them to her rear legs where she already has pollen stored.
With thanks to Prof. Phil Stevenson (Kew Gardens) for the proboscis cleaning clip.
Download BWARS hairy-footed flower bee leaflet or better still join BWARS!
Some excellent photographs here by Steven Falk
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