Subject: Bumble Bee?
Location: Oshawa, Ontario
May 30, 2013 12:10 pm
Hi
I found this bee wobbling along my deck this afternoon, so moved him to safety onto a shrub. I’ve seen what I believe are Common Eastern Bumble Bees, but never one like this. Do you know what type of bee it is?
Thanks!
Signature: Sue

Eastern Carpenter Bee

Dear Sue,
We will try to determine the correct species of this impressive Bumble Bee.  We have postdated your submission to go live in early June to compensate for our absence during a holiday.

Eastern Carpenter Bee

Thanks!
Later in the afternoon I saw another, same colours/pattern except fuzzy all over.
Sue

Correction:  12 June 2013
Thanks to a comment, we now realize this is a Carpenter Bee, not Bumble Bee
We suspect the bee Sue saw later that was fuzzy all over was most likely a Bumble Bee.

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Subject: Giant flying peanut?????
Location: Norther california bay area
April 11, 2013 7:26 pm
I have only seen this bug once, buzzing around the buckeye tree by the creek in Northern California.
It sounded like a bee, at first glance we thought that it was a carpenter bee loaded with pollen, but after I took the pictures, you can see that it is not! Sorry they are blurry, he never landed!
Do you have any idea what it could be????
Thanks for your help!
Signature: AMK in NorCal

Male Valley Carpenter Bee

Dear AMK in NorCal
This is a Carpenter Bee.  Male Valley Carpenter Bees are golden in color and live for a shorter time than the black females.  There is a pronounced sexual dimorphism in Valley Carpenter Bees.

Thank You!  I had no idea- we must have a lot of females since I have never seen this before.
Very interesting.  I really appreciate your response- especially so quick!!
Keep up the good work ;}

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Subject: Big Brown Bee by Orange Tree
Location: Sherman Oaks, CA
March 13, 2013 6:31 pm
Hello,
I noticed about 5 of these big brown bees flying in and around my orange tree with is starting to bud.
I’ve been living at this location for 3 years and have never seen this bug here or ever before.
Is it even a bee?
I live in the san fernando valley in southern California. Los Angeles County.
It seems to be about an inch in length. Orangish-brown in color and buzzes like a bee.
Let me know what you think.
Thanks
Signature: Rory Ambron

Male Valley Carpenter Bee

Dear Rory,
You are absolutely correct that this is a Bee, and more specifically, it is a male Valley Carpenter Bee.  Valley Carpenter Bees exhibit sexual dimorphism, meaning that the male and female look very different from one another.  The male is a lovely golden color with green eyes and the female is larger and black with black wings.  The female excavates a gallery for her brood in dead wood, and it is reported that Valley Carpenter Bees can do considerable damage over the years to telephone poles if they are plentiful.

Male Valley Carpenter Bee

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Subject: Super large bee
Location: Tampa Florida
February 21, 2013 6:47 pm
We found this bee in our yard in Tampa on Feb 21, 2013. It measures 2 inches long.
Signature: Lsolie

Male Carpenter Bee

Dear Lsolie,
This is a male Carpenter Bee, and we don’t believe it is a species native to Florida.  Members of the subgenus Neoxylocopa which includes the Valley Carpenter Bee, exhibit sexual dimorphism and the males are golden while the females are black.  BugGuide lists the range as:  “essentially a neotropical group, with a couple of spp. restricted to Pacific islands; in our area, one sp. widely western (to sw. BC), another only along the Mexican border (TX-AZ).”  To the best of our knowledge, no Carpenter Bees from eastern North America have golden males, though there are native Carpenter Bees. 

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Subject: Furry Golden Monster
Location: Puerto Vallarta, Jalisco, Mexico
February 3, 2013 3:31 pm
Dear Bugman,
While sitting on the end of a pier in Puerto Vallarta last week this scary guy landed on my shoulder. It was probably a little over 2 inches long and sounded like a helicopter when it buzzed by my ear. I’ve been trying to find out some facts about him but the internet has let me down. Please help!
Signature: -Bewildered Bob

Male Valley Carpenter Bee

Dear Bewildered Bob,
This is either a male Valley Carpenter Bee, Xylocopa varipuncta, or a closely related species in the same genus.  Valley Carpenter Bees exhibit sexual dimorphism, and there is a distinct visual difference between the sexes.  Males are golden in color while female Valley Carpenter Bees are black.

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Subject: Strange bugs in Uganda
Location: Jinja, Uganda
September 12, 2012 5:37 am
I found these in my yard in Jinja, Uganda. Much larger than what I’ve seen around my home in Georia, USA. I can’t find much info on insects in Uganda on the internet; hence my query. It is about 1.8” long. Thank You!

Carpenter Bee

This appears to be a Carpenter Bee. 

Thank you so much!  This will help me label my African bug collection.
Cheers!
Brad Smith
Uganda Technical Director

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Subject: Xylocopa virginica – Eastern Carpenter Bee (female?)
Location: Naperville, IL
September 1, 2012 9:40 pm
Hi Daniel~
I have dozens of these large bees visiting the butterfly bushes at my house. I have tried to get a good, clear photo of one for several weeks, but they’ve always got their faces in the flowers, and they don’t linger in any one location for very long, so my shots were always blurry, despite bright, sunny mornings. By bumping up the ISO, I was able to minimize motion blur yet still get good enough depth of field for the photo. And I finally confirmed that these are not bumble bees, but solitary carpenter bees. I read that males have whitish faces, but since I see only the back-faced variety, I am wondering if I am looking at it in the wrong way. I hope you have a lovely Labor Day weekend.
Signature: -Dori Eldridge

Eastern Carpenter Bee

Hi Dori,
Your efforts paid off.  We agree that this is an Eastern Carpenter Bee.  Since your photo does not show the individual head on, we are relying on your observations that the face is black, though it does appear to be black in the photo as well.  BugGuide provides some nice information on the Eastern Carpenter Bee, including:  “Nests (galleries) are built in dry, standing wood. Conifers are preferred. Eggs are laid on masses of pollen and nectar, several (6-8) to a gallery. One generation per year in most of range. Adults emerge in late summer, overwinter, mate and nest in spring. Perhaps two generations per year in Florida.”

Thank you, Daniel! I thought I sent a second, full-face photo of the carpenter bee, but I mustn’t have. My bushes are teeming with them now – late summer emergence. Luckily, they don’t appear to be drilling into my wooden siding. We had an exciting day here yesterday. A wooly bear caterpillar we found in our garage several weeks ago and kept as a “pet” was a bit overdue in emerging from its cocoon. I had been checking it daily, and yesterday when I lifted the mesh screen door of its box, I immediately saw a tiny exit hole in the cocoon, but no Isabella Tiger Moth. Instead, there was a guilty, but pretty nonetheless, red-eyed tachinid fly.  They seem well represented on whatsthatbug.com, so I won’t bother you with photos, but I did identify it as Leschenaultia bicolor, and in all my years rearing Monarchs, I have never heretofore come across one of these parasitoid flies. It was quite a surprise.
All the best to you,
-Dori Eldridge

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