| Tawny Mining Bee (Andrena fulva (Müller, 1766)) |
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Scientific name: Andrena fulva (Müller, 1766) Common name: Tawny Mining Bee French name: Andrène fauve Order: Hymenoptera Family: Andrenidae Wingspan : 12 to 14 mm for females, 10 to 12 mm for males. Biotope: Sparse woodlands, dry meadows, parks and gardens. Geographic area: Western and Central Europe, north to southern Scandinavia and east to the Balkans. Observation period : March to May |
Andrena sp. are solitary bees which dig their nest in the ground as a single gallery which ramifies and leads to several cells. Trochanters and femora of the females' hind legs are covered with tufts of curved hairs which are used to collect pollen. The tongue is short. The fore wings show three submarginal cells. The basal vein, running in diagonal towards the pterostigma and coming from the inner side, is very slightly curved. You can recognize female Andrena fulva with the dense bright reddish hairs covering the upper side and with the dense black hairs covering the underside, the head and the legs. The abdomen sometimes appears lighter coloured than the thorax and it may bears paler stripes. Males also show dense reddish hairs on the thorax. Hairs are less dense on the abdomen. They are black on the underside and white on the front of the head. They have short and thick mandibles. Each nest burrow ramifies and leads to about ten cells where the female lay one egg and store pollen and nectar for the larva. Some parasite Cuckoo bee species lay they eggs inside the burrow when the Tawny Mining Bee is away. |
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As soon as in March and April I am used to observing, in my garden, some small earth heaps which mark the presence of Andrena solitary bee's burrow. I am used to first observing Andrena cineraria and then, a little later in the season, Andrena fulva which is here on the picture walking out of its burrow. The small earth heaps also look much smaller for Andrena cineraria than for Andrena fulva. |
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Close-up view on Andrena fulva. The antennae of 12 articles (including scape and pedicel) indicate one female. Males have antennae with 13 articles but they have also a very different habitus with their white face and with their less hairy abdomen. |
André Bon February 2018