bee
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 monophyly, monophyletic lineage within the ...
from the family
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 b ...
, one of numerous
kleptoparasitic
Kleptoparasitism (etymologically, parasitism by theft) is a form of feeding in which one animal deliberately takes food from another. The strategy is evolutionarily stable when stealing is less costly than direct feeding, which can mean when foo ...
bees in the tribe ''Megachilini''. Members of the genus ''Coelioxys'' exhibit kleptoparasitic behavior in that they lay their eggs in the nests of other bees, typically those of the related genus ''
Megachile
The genus ''Megachile'' is a cosmopolitan group of solitary bees, often called leafcutter bees or leafcutting bees; it also includes the called resin bees and mortar bees. While other genera within the family Megachilidae may chew leaves or pe ...
''. As this behavior is similar to that of
cuckoo
Cuckoos are birds in the Cuculidae family, the sole taxon in the order Cuculiformes . The cuckoo family includes the common or European cuckoo, roadrunners, koels, malkohas, couas, coucals and anis. The coucals and anis are sometimes separ ...
s, such bees are referred to as
cuckoo bees
The term cuckoo bee is used for a variety of different bee lineages which have evolved the kleptoparasitic behaviour of laying their eggs in the nests of other bees, reminiscent of the behavior of cuckoo birds. The name is perhaps best applied to ...
. These host-parasite relationships are complex Host insects of the
brood parasite
Brood parasites are animals that rely on others to raise their young. The strategy appears among birds, insects and fish. The brood parasite manipulates a host, either of the same or of another species, to raise its young as if it were its own ...
The species was originally described in the ''Transactions of the American Entomological Society'' by
Ezra Townsend Cresson
Ezra Townsend Cresson, also Ezra Townsend senior (18 June 1838, in Byberry – 19 April 1926, in Swarthmore) was an American entomologist who specialised in the Hymenoptera order of insects. He wrote ''Synopsis of the families and genera of the H ...
in 1878.
Range and distribution
''Coelioxys sodalis'' are distributed across the northern portions of the North American continent from Alaska and British Columbia and Northwest Territory eastward across to Nova Scotia and the New England states, according to Mitchell. The range extends south through to high altitude regions in Arizona, according to Baker. They are most active spring through early fall. They are reportedly active as early as April 17 in Arizona and as late as September 8 in Alberta. Their habitat is primarily woodland. They have been collected in coniferous forests, as well as in deciduous forests inland and along the coast. In the lower latitudes of the range, they tend towards predominantly pine forests. Canadian specimens have been collected from the
ecotone
An ecotone is a transition area between two biological communities, where two communities meet and integrate. It may be narrow or wide, and it may be local (the zone between a field and forest) or regional (the transition between forest and gras ...
between the tundra and coniferous forest. They have also been observed in more
xeric
Deserts and xeric shrublands are a biome defined by the World Wide Fund for Nature. Deserts and xeric (ancient Greek xērós, “dry") shrublands form the largest terrestrial biome, covering 19% of Earth's land surface area. Ecoregions in this h ...
environments including
sagebrush steppe
Sagebrush steppe is a type of shrub-steppe, a plant community characterized by the presence of shrubs, and usually dominated by sagebrush, any of several species in the genus ''Artemisia''.
They are recorded to have been found on flowers of genera ''
Rhodora
''Rhododendron canadense'', the rhodora or Canada rosebay, is a deciduous flowering shrub that is native to northeastern North America.
Classification
Today's botanists consider the rhodora to be a distant relative of the other North American ...
'' and ''
Rubus
''Rubus'' is a large and diverse genus of flowering plants in the rose family, Rosaceae, subfamily Rosoideae, with over 1,350 species.
Raspberries, blackberries, and dewberries are common, widely distributed members of the genus. Most of these ...
''.
Morphology
Highly detailed physical descriptions were published in Theodore B. Mitchell's seminal work ''Bees of the Eastern United States II''. Bees resemble ''C. funeraria'' and darker specimens of ''C. rufitarsis''. Morphologic characteristics of females and males differ from these two examples based on differences in segmental arrangements of components of the abdomen wall. Female bees (11-13mm) are longer than the males (8-12mm). Both males and females are black across the entire body, including tegulae and legs. Both males and females have compound eyes positioned such that they are somewhat convergent below. However, lateral ocelli of females are not as near to the vertex margin as those of males. Across the geographic range, morphological differences have been noted. ''C. sodalis'' from the southern reaches have fascia more distinctly setal. Variations in proximal arrangements of the abdominal components has also been noted. Species obtained from western reaches more closely resemble ''Coelioxys quadridentata''.
Molecular biology
Characterization of the
nucleotide
Nucleotides are organic molecules consisting of a nucleoside and a phosphate. They serve as monomeric units of the nucleic acid polymers – deoxyribonucleic acid (DNA) and ribonucleic acid (RNA), both of which are essential biomolecules wi ...
and
protein sequences
Protein primary structure is the linear sequence of amino acids in a peptide or protein. By convention, the primary structure of a protein is reported starting from the amino-terminal (N) end to the carboxyl-terminal (C) end. Protein biosynthes ...
have been published, as noted in the NCBI repository.
sodalis
''Sodalis'' is a genus of bacteria within the family Pectobacteriaceae. This genus contains several insect endosymbionts and also a free-living group. It is studied due to its potential use in the biological control of the tsetse fly. ''Sodalis' ...