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Bee Guide

For this project, we are only interested in identifying certain groups of bees: honeybees, bumble bees, carpenter bees, metallic green bees and then we lump the rest of the solitary bees together. To see these bees and get some tips about telling them apart, click here.

There is a formal academic study about sunflower bees in the southwest. You can find it here

However, there are over 35,000 species of bees in the world and we think there are around 4,500 species of bees in the United States. It is incredibly difficult to identify bees to species without a microscope and even with a microscope, it can be hard. There are some common bees or groups of bees that you can learn. Mace Vaughan and Lisa Schonberg of the Xerces Society are collaborating with Gretchen LeBuhn of San Francisco State and the leader of the Great Sunflower Project on a Guide to Bees that will be out soon. We've given you a preview of the descriptions from the Guide on the left. We'll be updating these descriptions and adding pictures over the season. If you have a great picture that you are willing to share, do send it to us!

If you are interested in becoming a true expert, check out our links to the Discover Life keys. You too will become a disciple of Sam Droege who developed the keys.

The best way to learn your bees is to take the Bee Course.

The bible of bee literature is Charles Michener's Bees of the World. The second edition was just published in 2007. Mich should be an inspiration to all of us. This is a great year to celebrate Mich as he will be 90 on September 22.

Charles Michener teaching about bees.

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