eight are in serious decline, and only six remain widespread. Similar declines in bumblebees have been reported in Ireland, with 4 species being designated Endangered, another two species considered Vulnerable to extinction. A decline in bumblebee numbers could cause large-scale sweeping changes to the countryside, leading to inadequate pollination of certain plants. The world's first bumblebee sanctuary was established at Vane Farm in the Loch Leven National Nature Reserve in Scotland in 2008.
One common, yet incorrect, assumption is that the buzzing sound of bees is caused by the beating of their wings. The sound is actually the result of the bee vibrating its flight muscles, and this can be achieved while the muscles are decoupled from the wings—a feature known in bees but not other insects. This is especially pronounced in bumblebees, as they must warm up their bodies considerably to get airborne at low ambient temperatures. Bumblebees have been known to reach an internal thoracic temperature of 30 °C (86 °F) using this method.
The orchestral interlude "Flight of the Bumblebee" was composed by Rimsky Korsakov to represent the turning of Prince Guidon to visit his father, Tsar Saltan, in the opera The Tale of Tsar Saltan, however the music is considered to more accurately reflect the flight of a bluebottle fly rather than a bumblebee.
The music went on to inspire Walt Disney to have a bumblebee featured in his musical Fantasia and also sound as if it was flying in all parts of the theatre - the unsuccessful experimentation led to the music being excluded from the film and the eventual invention of surround sound.
Salvador Dali was inspired by the sound of a bumblebee to create one of his paintings Dream Caused by the Flight of a Bumble bee around a Pomegranate a Second before Awakening.
Orchid Bees. Euglossine bees, also called orchid bees, are the only group of corbiculate bees whose non-parasitic members do not all possess eusocial behavior. Most of the species are solitary, though a few are communal, or exhibit simple forms of eusociality. There are about 200 described species, distributed in five genera: Euglossa, Eulaema, Eufriesea, Exaerete and the monotypic Aglae, all exclusively occurring in South or Central America (though one species, Euglossa viridissima, has become established in the United States). The latter two genera are cleptoparasites in the nests of other orchid bees. All except Eulaema are characterized by brilliant metallic coloration, primarily green, gold, and blue (Figure 46).
A Nest of Orchid Bees.
Females gather pollen and nectar as food from a variety of plants, and resins, mud and other materials for nest building. Some of the same food plants are also used by the males, which however leave the nest upon hatching and do not return.
Male orchid bees have uniquely modified legs which are used to collect and store different volatile compounds (often esters) throughout their lives, primarily from orchids in the subtribes Stanhopeinae and Catasetinae, where all species are exclusively pollinated by euglossine males. These orchids do not produce nectar, and hide the pollen on a single anther under an anther cap; they are not visited by females. The whole pollinarium becomes attached to the male as it leaves the flower (Figure 47). Several flowers from other plant families are also visited by the bees: Spathiphyllum and Anthurium (Araceae), Drymonia and Gloxinia (Gesneriaceae),Cyphomandra (Solanaceae), and Dalechampia (Euphorbiaceae) contain one or more species that attract male euglossines.
A Male Orchid Bee with Highly Modified Legs. Image Courtesy Green Fly.
The chemicals are picked up using special brushes on the forelegs, transferred from there by rubbing the brushes against combs on the middle legs, and finally these combs are pressed into grooves on the dorsal edge of the hind legs, squeezing the chemicals past the waxy hairs which block the opening of the groove, and into a sponge-like cavity inside the hind tibia.
The accumulated "fragrances" are evidently released by the males at their d