Friday 1 June 2012: Bumblebee on Colombine

I could have shown the bright orange bottom of this Bumblebee but, just loved it's tongue as it extended out to collect pollen.

There are 24 species of Bumblebee in the UK but only about eight are commonly found throughout our land. Changes in agriculture and the loss of flowering plants have very much decreased our chances of finding a wide diversity of species in any one area.

Have you noticed that just as our verges start to flower and look pretty, some guy with a strimmer cuts it all down!

Many of our modern garden flowers, pretty as they may be, are not bee friendly. That long tongue, able as it is, can't penetrate into multi petalled varieties of our native plants.

Bumblebees are great pollinators and contribute millions of pounds to the UK economy only by flitting from flower to flower and enabling us to grow strawberries, peas, tomatoes and other crops.

Yes, they can sting but, they are very docile and you have to sit on one to make it react!

Bee kind to bees. :)

• Canon EOS 7D:
• f/3.5:
• 1/250":
• 100.0mm:
• ISO 200

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