Queen bee

Sorry, more bees. One thing I like about visiting New Zealand is seeing the bumblebees. There are four species of bumblebee (Bombus) here - introduced in 1885 to pollinate red clover. There are no bumblebees on mainland Australia, only in Tasmania. There is talk of introducing them though (not sure that would be a very good idea - introduced species always end up being more trouble than they are worth. Cane toads being a case in point.)


This is a queen - she was twice as big (at least an inch long) as the other bumblebees. It probably won't look so good large - high ISO as the agapanthus was in the shade.


No visit to Auckland is complete without a trip to MOTAT... and that's what we did today. The weather is excellent, by the way.