Bee garden

In the broad beans, borage, bacopa, fox gloves, aquilegia, tī kōuka flowers, the bees are busy this morning.

In the front garden there is more borage, and forget-me-nots, solomon’s seal, sage, clematis, roses and kowhai busy with bees.

There seem to be more bumble bees than honey bees, although the constant buzzing high up in the tī kōuka flowers seems to be honey bees. The bumbles often have impressive honey sacs.

This insect (below) was on the sage flowers and it chased away a bee trying to land on a nearby flower. I thought it was a wasp, possibly the common European wasp, but it is rounder in shape so it is possibly a drone fly, a species which pollinates many plants. They also produce the ‘rat-tailed maggots’ which are so-called because they have snorkel for breathing if they are in water. These fascinated me last summer in the chicken poo bucket. The chooks loved them and crowded around whenever I lifted the lid. There’s a nice thought when you’re roasting a chicken or poaching an egg. Yum!

The word ‘busy’ is aptly used for bees. They have often flown to the next flower – and the next and the next – while you are zooming in and focussing the camera.