Images

Ah, a dark Lasioglossum, small, all black, a bit of gloss on the thorax, sides rough, angulate, like crumpled tinfoil, except black. Small, common, and expected thoughout the East.

Ah, a dark Lasioglossum, small, all black, a bit of gloss on the thorax, sides rough, angulate, like crumpled tinfoil, except black. Small, common, and expected thoughout the East.

Lovely and subtle wings, patterned in tiny hairs and blinged with iridescenceOne of many species of slightly metallic Lasioglossum in the Dialictus group. Lasioglossum perpunctatum is a northernly inclined species found in the Appalachians and up across northern North America.

Another one of those metallic Lasioglossums in the Dialictus group....so similar until you look at them under the microscope ...where they continue to look so similar. It is a world of nuance to us, but somehow many Lasioglossum species evolve, do different things, partition the sexual universe and become species.

Lasioglossum tamiamense is a small, very southern, bee of the sweat bee the variety. It's one of those subtleties of identification that taxonomists spend a lot of time on, but doesn't involve a whole lot of other people.

From one of the coastal National Parks in St. John's County in Florida comes a lovely red-legged Lasioglossum tarponense. I think of this species as a sand specialist...living in the Florida scrubby sand coastal pine matrix that forms an important part of the natural matrix of the region behind the sand dunes.

Joan Milam collected this particular Lasioglossum. Darn if it doesn't look like all the rest of them. Photography by Brooke Alexander. Photography Information: Canon Mark II 5D, Zerene Stacker, Stackshot Sled, 65mm Canon MP-E 1-5X macro lens, Twin Macro Flash in Styrofoam Cooler, F5.0, ISO 100, Shutter Speed 200.

Philadelphia, Pennsylvania, collected by Stephanie Wilson at the Morris Arboretum

From Fossil Butte National Monument Wyoming...yet another Lasioglossum. Photo by Dejen Mengis.

A bee of western North America. This one was captured in Bryce Canyon National Park, one of the larger "sensu strictu" group of Lasioglossums.

A bee of western North America. This one was captured in Bryce Canyon National Park, one of the larger "sensu strictu" group of Lasioglossums.

Here is a bee that clearly loves woodlands: Lasioglossum versans. In the obscure morphological vernacular of tiny sweat bees, I identify it by its tiny bulging purple "nose" (supraclypeus) and its complete lack of a hair fan on the base of T1.

Lasioglossum versatum. One of the most common little sweat bees in the East. Particularly common in the cooler mid-latitudes. These bees can dominate the captures in surveys of bee species of a region. Something of a mess taxonomically.

Sand. The Golden Sand Loving Bee. When I think of bees that are sand loving I think of Lasioglossum vierecki. For one, how nice to have a golden orange bee to look at. For second it is common in sandy areas...so if you are going to find a sand specialist in a sand mine, dune, beach, barren, sandhill in the Northeast there you will find this little orange bee.

Lasioglossum birkmanni, Female

Lasioglossum birkmanni, female, Big Thicket National Preserve, Texas

New Hampshire...The White Mountains...Mount Washington....at the very top is tundra a small remnant of what was more extensive in the cold post glacial times and still harbors arctic species like this Lasioglossum boreale. At this point this is the only location that has had this species in New England.

Lasioglossum brunneiventre. Small, long head, found in the Mojave National Preserve in studies of sandy areas in National Parks. Photographs by Brooke Alexander.

A bee with a fat leg, or at least a wide one. Which is the most distinguising feature of this bee that sadly looks like a whole bunch of other Lasioglossum species. The name? = ...Lasioglossum callidum. Photograph by Brooke Alexander.

The Channel Islands lie off the southern coast of California and contain quite a few endemic plants and animals. Here is a bee species that falls in that category and was collected as part of an effort to survey the climatically vulnerable National Parks. Photography by Ashleigh Jacobs.

Aptly named: Lasioglossum coeruleum. Most of the many confusing members of these small sweat bees glimmer discretely in metallic integument, but our friend here takes it up a notch to and Osmia level.