''Xylocopa aerata'', the golden-green carpenter bee or green carpenter bee, is one of two species of
carpenter bee found only in the conservation areas around
Sydney
Sydney ( ) is the capital city of the state of New South Wales, and the most populous city in both Australia and Oceania. Located on Australia's east coast, the metropolis surrounds Sydney Harbour and extends about towards the Blue Mountain ...
, and in the
Great Dividing Range
The Great Dividing Range, also known as the East Australian Cordillera or the Eastern Highlands, is a cordillera system in eastern Australia consisting of an expansive collection of mountain ranges, plateaus and rolling hills, that runs rough ...
in
New South Wales in Australia. Its only other habitat as of 2020 is on
Kangaroo Island in
South Australia. The species is especially vulnerable to fire, and much of its habitat was burnt during the
2019-2020 bushfire season in Australia.
The bee gets its common name by its habit of burrowing into wood. It is not a social species and does not produce honey, but it is an important
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 maj ...
for several species of
Australian native plants
The flora of Australia comprises a vast assemblage of plant species estimated to over 30,000 vascular and 14,000 non-vascular plants, 250,000 species of fungi and over 3,000 lichens. The flora has strong affinities with the flora of Gondwana, ...
.
Description
It was originally described by F. Smith in 1851 as ''Lestis aeratus''.
[Smith, F. 1851. Notes on the habits of Australian Hymenoptera. Transactions of the Entomological Society of London ns 1: 179–181, pl. xvi figs 4, 5 80] Its specific epithet is the
Latin adjective ''aerata'', meaning "bronzed".
As its name implies, the golden-green carpenter bee is a metallic green in colour, although it may appear purplish or bluish from some angles. A large stocky bee (at nearly , one of the largest native bees in southern Australia
), it is often heard by its loud low-pitched buzzing while flying between flowers. The male has yellow face markings. The bee does have a sting which is potentially painful, although no stings have been recorded.
Distribution and habitat
The natural distribution was southeastern New South Wales from Sydney southwards (where it overlaps with ''
X. bombylans''), and into
Victoria and southeastern
South Australia.
[ However, the green carpenter bee went extinct on mainland South Australia in 1906 and in Victoria in 1938. Apart from conservation areas around Sydney, and in the Great Dividing Range, it exists only on the western half of Kangaroo Island in SA.][
They can be seen from spring to autumn, commonly feeding at pea flowers of the family , such as '' Gompholobium'' species, including '' Gompholobium latifolium'' in spring, and '']Pultenaea elliptica
''Pultenaea'' is a genus of about 100 species of flowering plants in the family Fabaceae, and is endemic to Australia. Plants in this genus are shrubs with simple leaves and orange or yellow flowers similar to others in the family but with the ...
'' in autumn. Flowers of ''Leucopogon
''Leucopogon'' is a genus of about 150-160 species of shrubs or small trees in the family Ericaceae, in the section of that family formerly treated as the separate family Epacridaceae. They are native to Australia, New Zealand, New Caledonia, the ...
'' and ''Leptospermum
''Leptospermum'' is a genus of shrubs and small trees in the myrtle family Myrtaceae commonly known as tea trees, although this name is sometimes also used for some species of ''Melaleuca''. Most species are endemic to Australia, with the greate ...
'' are also visited.[Species Xylocopa (Lestis) aeratus (Smith, 1851)]
Australian Biological Resources Study Australian Faunal Directory
Behaviour
The golden-green carpenter bee nests by hollowing out stalks of grasstrees ('' Xanthorrhoea''), or soft wood such as '' Banksia'', '' Casuarina'', ''Melaleuca
''Melaleuca'' () is a genus of nearly 300 species of plants in the myrtle family, Myrtaceae, commonly known as paperbarks, honey-myrtles or tea-trees (although the last name is also applied to species of '' Leptospermum''). They range in size ...
'' and ''Leptospermum''. The female excavates a tunnel with her jaws and picks up and dumps the wood shavings outside. The hollow can reach long by 1.1-1.4 cm diameter. Larger pieces of wood may allow for multiple tunnels. Several female bees may use a nest, one breeding and the others guarding. A bee defends the 0.7-1.0 cm wide entrance by blocking it with its abdomen (compare ''Allodapula
''Allodapula'' is a genus of bees in the family Apidae, subfamily Xylocopinae. They are similar in appearance, around 7mm in length, with swarthy head and thorax, contrasting with the brown abdomen. After the removal of a number of former species ...
''). Both male and female bees may overwinter within the tunnels. The tunnels are partitioned into several cells, where the mother bee lays an egg in each accompanied by provisions of nectar and pollen.
Conservation
Habitat clearing and large, intense bushfires led to extinction in some areas. The last green carpenter bee seen in Victoria was in December 1938 in the Grampians
The Grampian Mountains (''Am Monadh'' in Scottish Gaelic, Gaelic) is one of the three major mountain ranges in Scotland, that together occupy about half of Scotland. The other two ranges are the Northwest Highlands and the Southern Uplands. T ...
, not long before the Black Friday fires of January 1939. Fire destroys the dead wood the bee needs for nesting, and the flowers which it needs all the time.[
In 2007 a huge fire destroyed much of the vegetation in Flinders Chase National Park on Kangaroo Island, but left dry grass-tree stalks in the adjacent areas which were colonised by the bees. Conservationists also developed artificial nesting stalks to support the bee population until new banksia became available, which were placed in the fire-affected areas where the bee still occurred. Almost 300 female carpenter bees used the artificial stalks to raise their young, until disaster struck in the 2019-2020 bushfire season in Australia. Not only were the areas of the artificial stalks destroyed, but much of the old banksia habitat on Kangaroo Island, and the NSW fires destroyed large areas of habitat there too.][
]
References
{{Taxonbar, from=Q2051368
aerata
Hymenoptera of Australia
Fauna of New South Wales
Insects described in 1851