Male bees on patrol…

Male bees keeping watch on their patch of bush….

 

Dear All, Hello – have just been travelling through Western Kenya working on pollinators at various sites with groups of farmers. Its been amazing and I look forward to sharing some of the discoveries and photographs with you all over the next few days.

 

Yesterday I spent the day looking at insects in some mango farms in the Kerio Valley. During the hottest part of the day we decided to take a break and shelter in the shade while eating our lunch of (you guessed it!) mangoes.

 

As I settled down to the mango feast I noticed a loud buzzing sound drawing closer. Then a flash of yellow and black whirred by. A few seconds later it returned. At first I though, hmmm, this is someone after a piece of my mango. However, it kept circling the bush and showed no interest in the fruit.

 

 As I watched it closely, I realised that it was a male carpenter bee patrolling its territory. Looking out over the dappled bush I realised that there were literally hundreds of male bees doing the same thing – endlessly circling some prime spot in the hope of a female wandering by…

 

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Every ten seconds or so it returned to hover in a sunspot in front of me.

 

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It kept this up for the entire half-hour break that we took for lunch. Four hours later as I prepared to call it a day, the same male bees were still at it, endlessly circling their little patches of bush in the hopes of wooing a lady carpenter bees’ heart…

 

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