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Anthidium Florentinum
''Anthidium florentinum'', one of several European wool carder bees, is a territorial species of bee in the family Megachilidae, the leaf-cutter, carder, or mason bees. Description The species is a medium to large bee. Both sexes have a black abdomen bearing two yellow bands on each tergite. The male can be distinguished by the grey and or whitish hairs on the sides of the abdomen. Females are smaller than males and have pale yellowish pollen brushes on the underside of the abdomen. The nest is made in a crevice or the abandoned nest of another insect and is lined with chewed plant fibres. Phenology In both ''A. florentinum'' in southern France and ''A. manicatum'' in southern Germany, unlike the majority of solitary bees, a study found that there are more females than males, males are bigger than the females, and the sexes fly at the same times of year. P. Wirtz and colleagues suggest that this pattern is explained by the prolonged sexual receptivity of the females, along wit ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Johann Christian Fabricius
Johan Christian Fabricius (7 January 1745 – 3 March 1808) was a Danish zoologist, specialising in "Insecta", which at that time included all arthropods: insects, arachnids, crustaceans and others. He was a student of Carl Linnaeus, and is considered one of the most important entomologists of the 18th century, having named nearly 10,000 species of animals, and established the basis for the modern insect classification. Biography Johan Christian Fabricius was born on 7 January 1745 at Tønder in the Duchy of Schleswig, where his father was a doctor. He studied at the gymnasium at Altona and entered the University of Copenhagen in 1762. Later the same year he travelled together with his friend and relative Johan Zoëga to Uppsala, where he studied under Carl Linnaeus for two years. On his return, he started work on his , which was finally published in 1775. Throughout this time, he remained dependent on subsidies from his father, who worked as a consultant at Frederiks Hospital. ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Family (biology)
Family ( la, familia, plural ') is one of the eight major hierarchical taxonomic ranks in Linnaean taxonomy. It is classified between order and genus. A family may be divided into subfamilies, which are intermediate ranks between the ranks of family and genus. The official family names are Latin in origin; however, popular names are often used: for example, walnut trees and hickory trees belong to the family Juglandaceae, but that family is commonly referred to as the "walnut family". What belongs to a family—or if a described family should be recognized at all—are proposed and determined by practicing taxonomists. There are no hard rules for describing or recognizing a family, but in plants, they can be characterized on the basis of both vegetative and reproductive features of plant species. Taxonomists often take different positions about descriptions, and there may be no broad consensus across the scientific community for some time. The publishing of new data and opini ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Megachilidae
Megachilidae is a cosmopolitan family of mostly solitary bees. Both that their pollen-carrying structure (called a ''scopa'') is restricted to the ventral surface of the abdomen (rather than mostly or exclusively on the hind legs as in other bee families), and their typically elongated labrum is characteristic of this family. C. D. Michener (2007) ''The Bees of the World'', 2nd Edition, pg. 122, Johns Hopkins University Press. Megachilid genera are most commonly known as mason bees and leafcutter bees, reflecting the materials from which they build their nest cells (soil or leaves, respectively); a few collect plant or animal hairs and fibers, and are called carder bees, while others use plant resins in nest construction and are correspondingly called resin bees. All species feed on nectar and pollen, but a few are kleptoparasites (informally called "cuckoo bees"), feeding on pollen collected by other megachilid bees. Parasitic species do not possess scopae. The motion of Meg ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Mason Bee
Mason bee is a name now commonly used for species of bees in the genus ''Osmia'', of the family Megachilidae. Mason bees are named for their habit of using mud or other "masonry" products in constructing their nests, which are made in naturally occurring gaps such as between cracks in stones or other small dark cavities. When available, some species preferentially use hollow stems or holes in wood made by wood-boring insects. Species of the genus include the orchard mason bee '' O. lignaria'', the blueberry bee '' O. ribifloris'', the hornfaced bee '' O. cornifrons'', and the red mason bee '' O. bicornis''. The former two are native to the Americas, the third to eastern Asia, and the latter to the European continent, although ''O. lignaria'' and ''O. cornifrons'' have been moved from their native ranges for commercial purposes. Over 300 species are found across the Northern Hemisphere. Most occur in temperate habitats within the Palearctic and Nearctic zones, and are active from ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Tergite
A ''tergum'' (Latin for "the back"; plural ''terga'', associated adjective tergal) is the dorsal ('upper') portion of an arthropod segment other than the head. The anterior edge is called the 'base' and posterior edge is called the 'apex' or 'margin'. A given tergum may be divided into hardened plates or sclerites commonly referred to as tergites. In a thoracic segment, for example, the tergum may be divided into an anterior notum and a posterior scutellum. Lateral extensions of a tergite are known as paranota (Greek for "alongside the back") or ''carinae'' (Latin for "keel"), exemplified by the flat-backed millipedes of the order Polydesmida. Kinorhynchs have tergal and sternal plates too, though seemingly not homologous with those of arthropods. Tergo-tergal is a stridulatory mechanism in which fine spines of the abdominal tergites are rubbed together to produce sound. This process is known as abdominal telescoping. Examples File:Andrena spiraeana abdomen.jpg , Abdominal t ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Scopa (biology)
A scopa (plural scopae; Latin for "broom") is any of a number of different modifications on the body of a non-parasitic bee that form a pollen-carrying apparatus. In most species of bees, the scopa is simply a dense mass of elongated, often branched, hairs (or setae) on the hind leg. When present on the hind legs, the modified hairs are, at a minimum, on the tibia, but some bees also have modified hairs on the femur and/or trochanter. A few bees have, in addition to the leg hairs, many modified hairs on the ventral surface of the abdomen which are also used in pollen transport; one family of bees, the Megachilidae, lack modified leg hairs, but have an extensive scopa on the underside of the abdomen (see photo). Honey bees and bumblebees have a more highly-developed structure than the scopa: the corbicula, or pollen basket. Various species of bees have other types of modified hairs that collect pollen, floral oils, or other chemicals from plants; such hairs may be borne on the fa ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Pollinator
A pollinator is an animal that moves pollen from the male anther of a flower to the female stigma of a flower. This helps to bring about fertilization of the ovules in the flower by the male gametes from the pollen grains. Insects are the major pollinators of most plants, and insect pollinators include all families of bees and most families of aculeate wasps; ants; many families of flies; many lepidopterans (both butterflies and moths); and many families of beetles. Vertebrates, mainly bats and birds, but also some non-bat mammals (monkeys, lemurs, possums, rodents) and some lizards pollinate certain plants. Among the pollinating birds are hummingbirds, honeyeaters and sunbirds with long beaks; they pollinate a number of deep-throated flowers. Humans may also carry out artificial pollination. A pollinator is different from a pollenizer, a plant that is a source of pollen for the pollination process. Background Plants fall into pollination syndromes that reflect the type o ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Alfalfa
Alfalfa () (''Medicago sativa''), also called lucerne, is a perennial flowering plant in the legume family Fabaceae. It is cultivated as an important forage crop in many countries around the world. It is used for grazing, hay, and silage, as well as a green manure and cover crop. The name alfalfa is used in North America. The name lucerne is the more commonly used name in the United Kingdom, South Africa, Australia, and New Zealand. The plant superficially resembles clover (a cousin in the same family), especially while young, when trifoliate leaves comprising round leaflets predominate. Later in maturity, leaflets are elongated. It has clusters of small purple flowers followed by fruits spiralled in 2 to 3 turns containing 10–20 seeds. Alfalfa is native to warmer temperate climates. It has been cultivated as livestock fodder since at least the era of the ancient Greeks and Romans. Etymology The word ''alfalfa'' is a Spanish modification of the Arabic word ''al-faṣfa ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Anthidium
''Anthidium'' is a genus of bees often called carder or potter bees, who use conifer resin, plant hairs, mud, or a mix of them to build nests. They are in the family Megachilidae which is cosmopolitan in distribution and made up of species that are mostly solitary bees with pollen-carrying scopa that are only located on the ventral surface of the abdomen. Other bee families have the pollen-carrying structures on the hind legs. Typically species of ''Anthidium'' feed their brood on pollen and nectar from plants. ''Anthidium florentinum'' is distinguished from most of its relatives by yellow or brick-red thoracic bands. They fly all summer and make the nests in holes in the ground, walls or trees, with hairs plucked from plants. Most ''Anthidium'' species are leaf-cutting bees who use conifer resin, plant hairs, earth, or a combination of these as material for the nest walls. Their abdominal bands are usually interrupted in the middle. There is no lobe (arolium) between their cla ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Hymenoptera Of Europe
Hymenoptera is a large order of insects, comprising the sawflies, wasps, bees, and ants. Over 150,000 living species of Hymenoptera have been described, in addition to over 2,000 extinct ones. Many of the species are parasitic. Females typically have a special ovipositor for inserting eggs into hosts or places that are otherwise inaccessible. This ovipositor is often modified into a stinger. The young develop through holometabolism (complete metamorphosis)—that is, they have a wormlike larval stage and an inactive pupal stage before they mature. Etymology The name Hymenoptera refers to the wings of the insects, but the original derivation is ambiguous. All references agree that the derivation involves the Ancient Greek πτερόν (''pteron'') for wing. The Ancient Greek ὑμήν (''hymen'') for membrane provides a plausible etymology for the term because species in this order have membranous wings. However, a key characteristic of this order is that the hindwings are ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Insects Described In 1775
Insects (from Latin ') are pancrustacean hexapod invertebrates of the class Insecta. They are the largest group within the arthropod phylum. Insects have a chitinous exoskeleton, a three-part body (head, thorax and abdomen), three pairs of jointed legs, compound eyes and one pair of antennae. Their blood is not totally contained in vessels; some circulates in an open cavity known as the haemocoel. Insects are the most diverse group of animals; they include more than a million described species and represent more than half of all known living organisms. The total number of extant species is estimated at between six and ten million; In: potentially over 90% of the animal life forms on Earth are insects. Insects may be found in nearly all environments, although only a small number of species reside in the oceans, which are dominated by another arthropod group, crustaceans, which recent research has indicated insects are nested within. Nearly all insects hatch from eggs. Inse ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
