Yesterday on my sunday stroll in the city I came by a small wall with lots of flowers growing out of gaps in the wall.
Suddenly I spotted something moving, it was a #lizard ( #lacertidae ). With a quick movement, the lizard suddenly grabbed a bee that was collecting nectar on a flower.
Fortunately, the lizard was startled when it noticed me, so I was able to take a photo of it with my smartphone.
Today on my morning constitutional, I encountered a terrible sight. A single-use grill had been thrown into the trash and melted the trash can. My forever opinion is that single-use grills (engangsgrill) should be outlawed in Norway.
The worst part is that this particular trash can is right next to a pollinator park that's been installed to provide habitat for native bees.
To my knowledge, only the green party is against engangsgriller. Maybe I should vote for them next time
Bee's were once described as 'Coorus craiturs’ and certainly, they play a key role in Shropshire Folklore. Read all about their prominence in the county, including the 'Telling the Bee's' ritual 🐝
Nach fast 10 Jahren Pause habe ich wieder Bienen. Heute hat sich bei uns ein Schwarm gesammelt und ich habe das mal als Zeichen gedeutet, die Imkerausrüstung aus dem Keller zu holen 🐝 #bienen#bienenschwarm#imkerei#honig#beekeeping#bees#honey#beeswarm
How it started How its going
Despite other #neonics (clothianidin, imidacloprid and thiamethoxam) being banned outdoors in Europe, acetamiprid is allowed both in the EU and the UK because it is considered a low risk to #bees. But new research shows it's nearly 10,000 times more toxic to plant bugs, a key species that make up a significant proportion of many bird diets, than it is to honeybees. ht @Jeroen_van_der_Sluijshttps://www.biorxiv.org/content/10.1101/2024.04.11.589033v2.full.pdf
Only eight out of almost 21,000 bee species in the world die when they sting. Another subset can’t sting at all, and the majority of bees can sting as often as they want. But there’s even more to it than that... #Bees#Wildlife#Environment
The honeybee brain hosts over 600,000 neurons, at a density higher than that of mammalian brains:
"Our estimate of total brain cell number for the European honeybee (Apis mellifera;
≈ 6.13 × 10^5, s = 1.28 × 10^5; ...) was lower than the existing estimate from brain sections ≈ 8.5 × 10^5"
"the highest neuron densities have been found in the smallest respective species examined (smoky shrews in mammals; 2.08 × 10^5 neurons mg^−1 [14] and goldcrests in birds; 4.9 × 10^5 neurons mg^−1 [16]). The Hymenoptera in our sample have on average higher cell densities than vertebrates (5.94 × 10^5 cells mg^−1; n = 30 species)."
Ants, on the other hand ...
"ants stand out from bees and wasps as having particularly small brains by measures of mass and cell number."
Regarding nutrient and oxygen flow, would be interesting to compare the brains of a large bee like Xylocopa violacea (violet carpenter bee [1]) with that of a small bat like Craseonycteris thonglongyai (bumblebee bat [2]).
These two species are of about the same size (3-5 cm), yet one is an insect and the other is a mammal. Actually, the bee is larger than the bat! I wonder which one has more neurons.
Everything around the house has been trampled and compacted from the restoration project. Trying seeds to get as many plants as I can, including annuals, to fill in.
Finally started seeds I should have started weeks ago:
Corydalis flavula, Yellow Corydalis, an annual
Cuphea viscosissima, Clammy Waxweed, an annual
Monarda fistulosa, Bee Balm
I've got other seeds stratifying in the fridge. Again, weeks late, but we'll see what happens.
A happy day today for me and "My Little Bees": The Colletes, cellophane bees, have emerged, and by the dozens! This despite having their habitat trampled band compacted during construction.
They are especially numerous in the area that I not only forked, but overturned. There is little activity in the forked-only areas, and none at all in the still-compacted spots.
So, I am relieved, and have hope the population will recover.