End of year favourites - Hymenoptera

This is my last post of the year and the last review of the year.  The warm summer we had was a good one for bees and wasps and was especially memorable for the appearance of European hornets in our local nature reserve.  The image above has been the cover photo of the UK Bees, Wasps and Ants Facebook page for the past couple of months.

A new bumblebee that was high on my wish list was the bilberry bumblebee (Bombus monticola).  I found this one (♀) in Harwood Forest.

Emerging from my bee house on exactly the same date as last year (4th May), a red mason bee (Osmia bicornis ♂).

A nice surprise at my local pond, a tawny mining bee (Andrena fulva ♀).

A perennial favourite, the hairy-footed flower bee (Anthophora plumipes ♂).

I found an aggregation of orange-tailed mining bees (Andrena haemorrhoa) in the local nature reserve.  This is a female.

And chocolate mining bees (Andrena scotica ♀) in the house!

This cuckoo bee, Nomada marshamella, is a cleptoparasite of Andrena scotica but was seen at Ovingham, not at home.

A new bee in the garden, a male blue mason bee (Osmia caerulescens).  I haven't yet seen a female - perhaps next year.

And the highlight of the year - the European hornets (Vespa crabro) in my local nature reserve.  I do hope they return next year.