Halictidae - Furrow bees and Blood bees

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Bees, Wasps, Ants

Bees, wasps, ants and sawflies are all part of the insect order Hymenoptera.  A typical hymenopteran has 2 pairs of wings which are coupled together with tiny hooks.  Bees, wasps and ants are in the sub-Order Apocrita, with a definite waist between the thorax and abdomen. 

We have placed Sawflies in a separate gallery because they are in the sub-order Symphyta, and considered to be more primitive than other groups of the Hymenoptera. They are very different to bees, wasps and ants - one distinctive feature is that they don't have a waist. 

Whilst everyone is familiar with the social bumblebees and honeybees, these represent only about 10% of all the British bee species. The remainder are solitary bees that don't work together as a single colony to rear their young. 

There is an even greater diversity of wasps. As with the bees, there are a few social wasps that everyone is familiar with, but these represent just a small fraction of all UK wasps. Sand-wasps, Digger-wasps, Mason wasps and Potter wasps and many other species all have solitary life cycles.

Many wasps are parasitoids, attacking the immature stages of other insects and eventually killing their hosts. (A parasite lives within the host, but doesn't kill it).  Examples are Chalcids, Ichneumons and Braconids.  These are generally under-recorded species, and identification often requires the help of an expert in the group.

Ants are all social insects living in large colonies that work collaboratively.  Identification can be difficult, and several are under-recorded in our area.  Gavin Gamble has written some notes on Ant Recording and Identification to guide recorders. 

Many members of this group are difficult or impossible to identify from field images. Make sure that your images include the diagnostic features needed to make a definitive identification or get a recognised expert to confirm the identification.

Identification help

Specialist Facebook groups (recommended): 

Solitary bees

Halictidae - Furrow bees and Blood bees

A large family that includes the Furrow-bees - Halictus and Lasioglossum.  The females of both these genus have a median 'furrow' or rima on the tergite at the end of the abdomen.  Both have patches of pale hairs on the abdominal tergites.  In Lasioglossum species, the hairs are along the base of the tergite, hence the common name Base-banded Furrow bees.  In Halictus species the hairs are on the hind margin, plus sometimes the base of the tergites - hence the common name of End-banded Furrow bees. 

The Blood bees (Sphecodes) usually have red and black abdomens.  They are cleptoparasites of ground-nesting solitary bees, including Halictus, Lasioglossum and Andrena. The female enters a host's nest and breaks into the cell, killing the egg or grub.  She lays one of her own eggs and reseals the cell.  When the egg hatches, the grub consumes the food intended for the host species' larva.   Identification help is in Steven Falk's note from the Sphecodes Identification Workshop held by BWARS (2019).