Bee and a Shieldbug

[lesno1]

[Geoff F]

I am finding lots of those Green Shieldbugs recently, but I'm not sure about that bee. Each spring, when there isn't much other insect action, I decide that I am going to have a serious go at learning bee identification; but a few weeks later my identification books go to the back of my bookcase and I start looking for easier subjects. There are so many bees that look virtually identical.

[tscholent]

Mason bee…google it…very beneficial especially when “real bees” aren’t around.

[Jim A]

Very nice, particularly the Mason Bee. Did not even know of their existence, Lee. However now found out that we have them here in New Zealand. My wife has heard of them, however. My first search result showed that Mason Bee is also the name of a technology company in NZ!

[LienDouglas]

Nice I like the pictures you shared.

[revi]

I am finding lots of those Green Shieldbugs recently, but I'm not sure about that bee. Each spring, when there isn't much other insect action, I decide that I am going to have a serious go at learning bee identification; but a few weeks later my identification books go to the back of my bookcase and I start looking for easier subjects. There are so many bees that look virtually identical.

Indeed, when I see in the description of the family or genus "identifying individual species requires examination under the microscope after preparation", I give up right there. Besides lacking the knowledge to do that, I don't think killing anything just for identification is responsible behaviour these days (for an amateur, scientific projects may need precise identifications)

[Geoff F]

Yes it is unfortunate that many insects cannot be fully identified from a live specimen. Professional entomologists say that the taking of one insect doesn't have any impact on the overall population, particularly considering all those killed and eaten by birds and spiders etc. But how many people are only taking one specimen? I'm never keen on those so called Bio Blitz events for that reason.

So I tend to restrict myself to those species which can be identified from good quality photographs. For example, here is a Buffish Mining Bee which I found a few days ago.

https://pbase.com/crustacean/image/1...0/original.jpg