The reproduction of silverfish is preceded by a "love dance", involving three phases, which may last over half an hour. In the first phase, the male and female stand face to face, their trembling antennae touching, then repeatedly back off and return to this position. In the second phase the male runs away and the female chases him. In the third phase the male and female stand side by side and head-to-tail, with the male vibrating his tail against the female.^[3] Finally the male lays a spermatophore, a sperm capsule covered in gossamer, which the female takes into her body via her ovipositor to fertilize the eggs she will lay later on.

-wikipedia

you-GLOSS-in-ee, you-glo-sa

Today went very well. I started off in the gym, and did a little yoga, soaked up some sun, and went to meet T for lunch at school. He had to go learn acid and base wash, or something to that effect, and I went into the lab to my Bombus. It went much more smoothly today, and I became much more familiar with all my bumbles.

While in the compactors fetching trays, I realised I might want to have a little bit of a look at the other surrounding bees in the row. I pulled out a draw of Euglossini, giant orchid bees. They were huge, slighly metalic green and baige and black. I went down a few more, and saw some of the most beautiful bees I have ever seen in my life. They literally took my breath away. I think I'm in love with them. So now that I am at home, my interest has been fully sparked, and I want to learn more. A few staples, wikipedia and google image search and I've found a nice example. New time I go into the lab I want to bring my camera and snap a few picture of them too.

Apparently they are exclusively tropical, so I'd have to go to Mexico or central America to find any. There is one species Euglossa viridissima, which has become established in Florida. I'm reading a paper right now about the introduction of this foreign species. The bees of this group are solitary. They are very beautiful and shiney. The males put all their time and effort into collecting scents with which they perfume themselves, perhaps as recognition or as a sign of male fitness.

Haha wow, this is interesting. The male orchid bees have the unusual behavior of activly collecting large amounts of DDT from homes in Brazil, and do not suffer any harm from the insecticide. WEIRD!

The males have modified hind legs to carry the fragrances they collect.


Well now I'm just going to go collect a bunch of images to try and capture the ranges colors and beauty of these bees.



I like that last one because it looks like the bees are playing :)

Bombus

Well, today I went in and worked with the bees. Bombus. I am still new to species names, and on many of the specimenins I found the word "chrysothamnus" as in the flower. I thought, hmm, that's like the flower, but I thought it might be a species name, but I sorted a bunch accordingly. Long story short, I fumbled a bunch of sorting into bees found on common flowers, but at least I learned. So now I am going to try and focus down into the genus Bombus in which I am working in the collection. I will go back tomorrow, hopefully more adept and knowlegable than today.


So Bombus. I'm going to BugGuide website to get my information.

Subgenus Bombias
Species Bombus auricomus
Species Bombus nevadensis
Subgenus Bombus
Species Bombus affinis - Rusty Patched Bumble Bee
Species Bombus terricola - Yellowbanded Bumble Bee

Subgenus Cullumanobombus
Species Bombus crotchii
Species Bombus fraternus - Southern Plains Bumble Bee
Species Bombus griseocollis - Brownbelted Bumble Bee
Species Bombus rufocinctus - Redbelted Bumble Bee


Bombus morrisoni

Subgenus Psithyrus (Cuckoo bumblebees)
Species Bombus citrinus - Lemon Cuckoo Bumble Bee
Species Bombus fernaldae - Fernald Cuckoo Bumble Bee
Species Bombus insularis - Indiscriminate Cuckoo Bumble Bee

Subgenus Pyrobombus
Species Bombus bifarius
Species Bombus bimaculatus - Twospotted Bumble Bee
Species Bombus flavifrons
Species Bombus huntii
Species Bombus impatiens - Common Eastern Bumble Bee

Bombus centralisBombus mixtus

Subgenus Thoracobombus
Bombus fervidus californicus

Subgenus Bombus sensu strictoBombus terricola occidentalis
Ok, well I don't recognize any of the species names, so I will try a wikipedia world bumblebee species list http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_world_bumblebee_species#Bombias
And going back to the list insert the ones I recognize from the lab.

And now I'm finding some pictures from http://www.discoverlife.org/mp/20q?search=Apoidea

Well that's a bit better. It's all a matter of familiarity. These sites would be good identification tools. But my task is more to take the already identified specimens and put them into already existing boxes. I'm no expert, so it's not really my place to try to ID anything...yet!

Bee Phylogeny

So my task is to sort through the bees in the collection and consolidate them and organize them by genus and basically make order of the chaos. I have decided to start with a basic exploration of the bee phylogenetics to familiarize myself. I think I will go in tomorrow and get back into the collection.

LONG TOUNGUED BEES

Family Apidae
(3 subfamilies, 33 tribes, 170 genera, ~5130 species)

So this family includes the carpenter bees (subfamily Xylocopinae),

the cleptoparasitic (cuckoo) bees (subfamily Nomadinae),

the long-horned bees (tribe Eucerini),

the corbiculate bees (orchid bees [Euglossini],

bumble bees [Bombini],

stingless bees [Meliponini],

and honey bees [Apini]),

Have diverse nesting habits and includes several eusocial lineages, such as the tribe Allodapini and the eusocial corbiculate groups. Many apid groups show narrow host-plant associations including some genera within the Eucerini, Centridini, Anthophorini, Ctenoplectrini, and Emphorini



Family Megachilidae
(2 subfamilies, 7 tribes, 74 genera, ~3170 species)

The family Megachilidae includes the familiar leaf-cutter bees.













SHORT TONGUED BEES

Family Colletidae
(5 subfamilies, 5 tribes, 54 genera, ~2000 spp.)

Colletidae is widely considered to be the most primitive bee family. Colletids are a diverse group ranging from small, slender, relatively hairless bees (such as Euryglossinae) to large, robust, hairy bees (such as Diphaglossinae).

Family Andrenidae
(4 subfamilies, 6 tribes, 36 genera, ~2330 species)

The family Andrenidae includes morphologically diverse bees, most of which are narrow host-plant specialists

Family Stenotritidae
(2 genera, 21 species)

This family includes two Australian genera of large, robust, hairy bees comprising a total of 21 species.

Family Halictidae
(4 subfamilies, 2 tribes, 75 genera, ~3500 species)

This family includes approximately 3500 species of morphologically diverse bees distributed on all continents except Antarctica. Monophyly of the halictids is well supported by numerous head and mouthpart characters

Family Melittidae
(3 subfamilies, 3 tribes, 14 genera, 164 species)

This family consists of just 164 species of morphologically diverse, short-tongued bees. Members of this family are distributed in the temperate regions of the northern Hemisphere and in Africa. Melittids are absent from Australia and the Neotropics