Greater bee fly: Bombylius major
"I've
started seeing a different kind of bee lately," Mark said as April
rolled in. "It's a bit smaller than a honeybee
and...simpler."
I knew exactly what he
was talking about since I'd noticed the same
insect hovering in mid-air as I worked around the yard. It looked
like a child's drawing of a bee --- just one big hunk of fluff with
wings. But it wasn't a bee.
The Greater Bee Fly (Bombylius
major)
is a fly that mimics a bee both in appearance and in behavior.
Once our peach flowers opened up, about a tenth of the pollinators
drawn to the abundance of nectar and pollen were bee flies. The
flies are easy to distinguish from true bees since they have a habit of
hovering, hummingbird-like, in front of flowers, or landing and showing
off their extra long legs.
Like many garden
insects, bee flies aren't really good or bad.
They're a great pollinator, but the flies also parasitize solitary bees
and wasps, thus cutting down on the population of other pollinators and
predators. Unlike other bee mimics that try to piggy-back on
predators' aversion to stinging insects, bee flies probably mimic bees
so that they can get close to the bees' burrows and fling their eggs
inside. When the bee fly eggs hatch out, the larval flies feed on
the larval bees, killing the bees in the process. Despite the
death toll, I consider the presence of bee flies a good sign since it
signals
a healthy and varied insect population. It's best not to put all
of your pollinator eggs in one basket.
This post is part of our Native Pollinators lunchtime series.
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