Maybe I'm trying to make amends with bees, aside from appreciating them while out and about or sitting out back on the patio with a drink just observing, I can recall the day I hurled a green walnut at my sister which inadvertently landed directly in a ground-nesting bee colony at her feet (that didn't go well). In more recent years, cutting buckthorn with a brushsaw only to see a cloud of angry bees rise up from a brush pile. The 10 or so stings I received while bounding frantically through conifer plantation slash piles probably garnered some choice words, f-bombus's.
Yesterday an information session was held at the Visitor Centre to go over some of the details. Alistair MacKenzie spoke to the park's significance as habitat to an estimated 200 significant species. Sheila Colla provided some interesting background information on a variety of bumble bee species, both common and rare, and also outlined the most recent sightings of Rusty-patched at the Pinery (as well as 40 or so sightings in the last couple of years, mainly in Illinois and Wisconsin). Victoria McPhail of Wildlife Preservation Canada also introduced the group to Bumble Bee Watch, a site the runs on the same platform as ebutterfly. Very cool stuff.
Pinned specimens of both Rusty-patched (pink label) and federally significant (soon-to-be provincially) Gypsy Cuckoo Bumble Bee (Bombus bohemicus) (white label) were on hand. The Rusty-patched has the rust-coloured patch on the abdomen which is surrounded by yellow. This is probably the easiest way to distinguish from a pile of other bees with orange/brown colouration on the abdomen.
I didn't capture the Gypsy Cuckoo well in these photos, but the lower portion of the abdomen is white or off-white (the remainder black). These bees are a social parasite on Rusty-patched, B. terricola and B. occidentalis). Social parasitism in bumble bees involves the parasite species killing off the queen of a host species, laying their own eggs in the nest, and having the worker bees of that colony raise their young.
After the information session Alyssa and I went for a stroll on the Cedar Trail. The feeders at the Visitor Centre were lively.
Probably 20-30 White-breasted Nuthatch
A half dozen or so Tufted Titmouse and a bunch of chatty Black-capped Chickadee
Along the Cedar Trail, near the Old Ausable Channel I found last year's stem of Rough Blazing-star (Liatris aspera).
This year's Balsam Ragwort (Packera paupercula).
Bearberry (Arctostaphylos uva-ursi) in a clearing of Little Bluestem, Indian Grass and Balsam Ragwort.
The remains of Wood Betony (Pedicularis canadensis) flowers from 2014.
The remains of Cylindrical Blazing-star (Liatris cylindracea) below. A funny side note, back at the Visitor Centre I was paging through the Sightings Book at the desk before leaving; I always like to browse these books/white boards to see what's been spotted recently. The bird tab yielded a tonne of sightings from 2014 into early 2015, lots of herpetofauna, hog-nosed snake, turtles, frogs, good good, mammals, I had no idea there were chipmunks at the Pinery! haha just kidding, flying squirrels, dorito-eating raccoons, some observations of bear and moose written in crayon (I'll take with a grain of salt). Plants (rubs hands together in anticipation), whadda we got? Pat Deacon, June 6, 2014 "Liatris cylindracea on Cedar Trail"...followed by a measly 5 additional entries between June 6 and now! I got a good chuckle. On last count the park was home to 757 species of vascular flora.
We made a brief stop at the fields on Greenway Road to watch the 75 or so Tundra Swans.
Sweet pics Pat! Love those shots of affinis and bohemicus. Ive seen bohemicus up in Algonquin (back when it was called ashtoni).
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