The bee’s needs
This is a photograph of a thin, undernourished bumble bee.
One evening it was observed flying around a light in the centre of a lounge while folk were watching TV.
No-one could work out how it came to be inside a house but presumed that it must have come in through a window during the day.
It buzzed around the light until it seemed to fall to the ground and appeared exhausted.
It was placed in a container until it could be released the next morning.
Next morning it could crawl but not fly so some sweetened water was carefully inserted into some of the blooms on this grape hyacinth flower and the bumble bee was encouraged to climb up the stem and onto the flower.
It immediately showed interest and as can be seen in the photograph it extended its long tongue and began to probe into the blooms.
It soon found some of the sweetened water in one of the blooms and began to feed.
After several minutes of feeding it moved away and began to flex its wings.
Soon there was a distinct bumble bee buzz so it was taken outside where it immediately took off and started feeding on nearby pear blossoms. It had been refuelled.
This conservation measure can often save weakened bees.
There are four species of bumble bee in New Zealand.
They were imported to pollinate flowers particularly red clover. One species, bombus terrestris has a short tongue and was not a good pollinator but the bee in the photograph, bombus ruderatus, has a very long tongue and is a successful pollinator.
Bumble bees are valuable insects to have around.
One bumble bee can pollinate more than 400 flowers in an hour.