The Bees, Wasps and Ants Recording Society (BWARS) is a British society dedicated to recording
bees
Bees are winged insects closely related to wasps and ants, known for their roles in pollination and, in the case of the best-known bee species, the western honey bee, for producing honey. Bees are a monophyletic lineage within the superfamil ...
,
wasps
A wasp is any insect of the narrow-waisted suborder Apocrita of the order Hymenoptera which is neither a bee nor an ant; this excludes the broad-waisted sawflies (Symphyta), which look somewhat like wasps, but are in a separate suborder. T ...
and
ant
Ants are eusocial insects of the family Formicidae and, along with the related wasps and bees, belong to the order Hymenoptera. Ants evolved from vespoid wasp ancestors in the Cretaceous period. More than 13,800 of an estimated total of 22 ...
s.
The recording of these
insect
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 ...
s is most important to monitor the health of an
ecosystem
An ecosystem (or ecological system) consists of all the organisms and the physical environment with which they interact. These biotic and abiotic components are linked together through nutrient cycles and energy flows. Energy enters the syste ...
, and in the past, studies of
British ants were carried out by such notable
myrmecologists
Myrmecology (; from Greek: μύρμηξ, ''myrmex'', "ant" and λόγος, ''logos'', "study") is a branch of entomology focusing on the scientific study of ants. Some early myrmecologists considered ant society as the ideal form of society and ...
as
Horace Donisthorpe
Horace St. John Kelly Donisthorpe (17 March 1870 – 22 April 1951) was an eccentric United Kingdom, British myrmecologist and coleopterist, memorable in part for his enthusiastic championing of the renaming of the genus ''Lasius'' after him as ...
and
Sir John Lubbock
John Lubbock, 1st Baron Avebury, 4th Baronet, (30 April 183428 May 1913), known as Sir John Lubbock, 4th Baronet from 1865 until 1900, was an English banker, Liberal politician, philanthropist, scientist and polymath. Lubbock worked in his fam ...
.
See also
*
List of bees of Great Britain
This article contains a list of bees of Great Britain. The following species are all within the superfamily Apoidea.
Family ''Colletidae''
Genus ''Colletes'': plasterer bees
* ''Colletes cunicularius'', vernal colletes bee or spring mining- ...
*
List of wasps of Great Britain
This article contains a list of wasps of Great Britain. The following species are of the order Hymenoptera and suborder Apocrita that is neither a bee nor ant.
Family Dryinidae
Family Embolemidae
* ''Embolemus ruddii''
Family Bethy ...
*
List of ants of Great Britain
This is a list of ants of Great Britain, including endemic and introduced species. Compared with much of the rest of Europe, Great Britain has a smaller number of ants. The size and diversity of ant species in any area is largely determined by the ...
References
External links
BWARS website
{{Coord, 52, 47, 20.1, N, 1, 34, 19.9, W, display=title
British biology societies
Conservation in the United Kingdom
Entomological organizations