Скачать или смотреть Hibiscus bee digging her nest

A couple clips of a hibiscus bees (Ptilothrix bombiformis) excavating her nest.



I found these two nests in July 2018 in New Brunswick, NJ on a dirt road near the Rutgers community gardens.



Ptilothrix have a couple of unique behaviors for excavating nests in hard packed soil. The females will collect water from nearby puddles to soften the surface of the soil as they start their nest, that's why the ground where the first bee was digging looks wet. The way the second bee is balling up the soil and flinging it away from the nest entrance is another characteristic of Ptilothrix nesting. Most species of ground-nesters kick out loose soil to make a little mound called a tumulus.


These little artisans will probably place a single nest cell at the end of a short vertical tunnel, then start over from scratch, water droplets and all, to lay the next egg.