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June 07, 2007
The Wool-Carder Bee
The Wool-carder bee, Anthidium manicatum (Megachilidae) is a Palearctic Megachilid bee that has found its way into the NE US. Unlike most bees, the males are larger than the females, and are territorial. Female bees use the trichomes harvested from plant stems to create small balls of fluff that they use to line the cell walls. I have been watching the bees in my garden for the past 5 years, and this species has been fun to observe. I'm working on a small paper about its behavior in a suburban yard. If you live in Ann Arbor and see this bee in your garden, email me.
Interesting Link: Solitary Bees Home
Posted by mfobrien at 02:49 PM | Comments (0)
June 04, 2007
Update on Brood XIII search
On Friday, June 1, I drove to SW Michigan in search of any possible sightings of Magicicada Brood XIII. I drove all sorts of back roads in Cass and Berrien Co., as close to the Indiana border as possible, often looping N towards better woods. I stopped whenever possible to listen for at least a minute for the tell-tale eerie sounds of singing Magicicada septendecim. I also stopped at Warren Woods, and although there were no cicadas there, I did see a gray petaltail dragonfly, Tachoptyeryx thoreyi - at one of the few known places where it breeds in Michigan.
Although I came up with no records after driving about 425 miles, it means that at least I did look, and where I looked and listened, they were not there. Does that mean that Brood XIII isn't there somewhere? Probably unlikely. I spoke with Dick Alexander about Marlatt's old records, and he believes that some of those records may have been erroneously based on Okanagana (an annual species that looks similar to a Magicicada). I can certainly see how that could happen, back when people were less aware of the differences. The second set of factors is that with all of the agriculture and spraying that has gone on in the last 150 years in that area, it would not have taken too much to wipe out small pockets of Brood XIII - if they were ever there. Imagine emerging after 17 years, only to find that the woods where your ancestors resided is now a cornfield? Whether Brood XIII was really ever in Michigan is not going to be answered definitively. However, I went back and changed the Brood XIII map on our web server so that instead of the range extending into MI, there is now a green question mark, which is about as precise as we can be.
Posted by mfobrien at 10:58 AM | Comments (1)