Images

More Green Bees. This is a common one, one of the commonest summer bees in the East. Agapostemon virescens. The females have a black abdomen unlike the other female Agapostemons in the East which are bright green all round. This one was caught in Caroline County in Maryland. Picture by Amanda Robinson.

Here is the face of the specimen in the previous photo.Canon Mark II 5D, Zerene Stacker, 65mm Canon MP-E 1-5X macro lens, Twin Macro Flash, F5.0, ISO 100, Shutter Speed 200, link to a .pdf of our set up is located in our profile

White Snakeroot, Ageratina altissima. Collected and Photographed by Helen Lowe Metzman.

Today - Amazonite up close. So interesting to go from photographing the complexity of carbon based insect life to the complexity of minerals. One earth, all connected, such glory that cannot be recreated by men.

Amblycorypha oblongifolia, Oblong-winged katydid, Upper Marlboro, Maryland, July 2012

India = An unknown species of Amegila collected by Suzanne Batra.

Ammobates muticus, Mediterranean Bee Stalker, specimen collected by E.L. Merim in Palermo, ItalyAnother red-abdomened cuckoo bee; why is it that so many cuckoo bees are more brightly colored than their hosts?

This is picture 2 from a 12 picture invited series by Matt Buffington at the USDA Parastitic Hymentoptera group using specimens from the U.S. Natural History Museum Smithsonian. Matt uses a system very similar to ours to photograph and stack this super tiny wasp. This native of the Rift Valley in Africa is called Anacharoides.

A couple more shots of Andrena asteris, one male, and one female. Note the super fluffy hairs on the hind tibia of the female.

Andrena astragali, female, Badlands National Park, SD

Andrena banksi, female, covered in pollen

Andrena banksi, male

Andrena barbara, male

A female collected by Tracy Zarillo from the New Haven area

A female collected by Tracy Zarillo from the New Haven area

For some reason I really like the lighting on the face of this specimen... eerie, the bee contemplating the decline of its own kind, that sort of thing. But I depart...Here is Andrena bradleyi, the Long-faced Mining Bee, a vaccinium (blueberry) specialist. If you hang out around blueberries then you might find this bee...the flowering plants that is.

As its name implies, Andrena caerulae, is a bee with a deep blue shimmer to its skin. Unlike the plain black models of most of the other 500+ species of Andrena this species stands out, making identification a bit easier.

I love the form of this shot.

Tim McMahon hunted down this Ancyloscelis in Costa Rica. The long tongue on this relatively small bee is a thing. This group as a whole has an affinity for flowers with long carollas. In particular, the love morning glories. Which is interesting, because you don't really see morning glories in the seed mix for pollinator plots.

Andrena accepta, South Dakota, Badlands National Park

Andrena aliciae, female