Lasioglossum tamiamense, F, side, Florida, St. Johns County

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. Not a bee species that people recognize when they look at it, not particularly sexy, it's around, it pollinate's, but so are many other Lasioglossum species in that group. It's distinct but not incredibly distinct from other Lasioglossum species and so misidentified quite often, it's nests are unknown, its ecological role is unknown or at least not known to be anything different from any other small tiny bee, it undoubtedly is full of all sorts of interesting habits and life histories that remain for us to study in future years. Photograph by Kamren Jefferson. 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 USGSBIML Photoshopping Technique: Note that we now have added using the burn tool at 50% opacity set to shadows to clean up the halos that bleed into the black background from "hot" color sections of the picture.