Hi, welcome to the USDA Agricultural Research Service
Pollinating Insects Research Unit on the campus of Utah State University.
This facility is fondly known as "The Logan Bee Lab".
The mission of this research unit is to perform agriculturally related research
on all bees, not just honey bees.
In particular, we study
the biology and management of alfalfa leaf cutting bees, blue orchard bees,
and western species of bumble bees.
In addition, we also study the biology and systematics of all types of bees
from the United States and from around the world.
My primary work is on the alfalfa leaf cutting bee,
and the blue orchard bee.
In the following presentation I'd like to introduce you to the blue orchard bee,
osmia lignaria, and highlight the reasons you may be interested in having them
nest and pollinate in your backyard, in garden areas,
or in commercial production orchards.
Why might you be interested in the blue orchard bees as manage pollinators?
First, let me tell you a little more about these bees.
They are in the family megachilidae, and their scientific name is osmia lignaria.
Related bee species osmia bicornis, and osmia cornifrons are raised
for commercial fruit production in Europe and Asia.
Osmia cornifrons also was imported into the US in the 1980's,
and has been reproducing in the Northeast and some Mid-Western and Western states.
Here's the life-cycle of the blue orchard bee.
Over the winter the adults are in cocoons, where they stay for at least 180 days
to ensure that in the spring they will emerge quickly and synchronously.
They emerge, mate, and forage out in orchards, or backyards, or wherever
they find flowering plants.
They build their nest by starting with a mud plug at the back of the nest,
adding nectar and pollen, and then laying an egg.
Then they seal the nest cell.
After the nest cell is sealed, the mother bee never visits
her babies bees again.
The larva that develops from the egg continues to go through
developmental stages until it becomes a pre-pupa,
which is a large larva that spins a cocoon, and this happens during the summer.
That pre-pupa then develops to a pupa, and then later into and adult,
and this is still during the summer, but by late fall and early winter the bees
are ready to go back into cold storage, either naturally or through management.
The reasons that blue orchard bees are effective at pollinating spring crops
is because they like to fly in the cool weather, and they will fly
at temperatures lower than honey bees do.
They also collect the pollen from the flowers and place it onto their abdomen,
which is kind of the bee belly where specialized hairs are located.
This contrasts to a honey bee that collects the pollen on her legs, and she also
collects this pollen with bee spit that she adds so that it's really sticky
and stays on her legs.
The blue orchard bee collects this pollen dry, and is able to deliver the pollen
from flower to flower more efficiently.
The bee's behavior also differ.
The blue orchard bee moves between rows of trees and amongst flowers more so than
the honey bee.
These pictures show you the blue orchard bee visiting flowers and moving about at it's
nest site, showing how the pollen is quite loose and also can be moved across
the face of flowers where the reproductive parts are located.
Blue orchard bees are highly efficient for pollinating spring crops such as almonds,
cherries, apples, and raspberries.
All of which also are in the rosaceaes family of plants.
To pollinate almonds the pollen needs to move across varieties in orchards.
So, orchards are usually established so that the main crop, such as nonpareil almonds in
this picture, is bordered by two other varieties of almonds, here: monterey,
and padre.
So, pollen has to move from other rows into the nonpareil to pollinate the nonpareil.
So, when honey bees visit the trees they normally stay within a row or within
a tree, such that they're not usually moving pollen between rows, but blue orchard bees
have more erratic behavior and seem to zoom all across the orchard, moving pollen
across rows.
So whether you're thinking about blue orchard bees for visiting flowers in
your backyard or want them to be pollinators for large orchards, we hope that this video
has helped you to understand why you should choose and to try blue orchard bees.
So, I hope you enjoyed this presentation.
For more details on blue orchard bees and how to manage them look to
the world-wide-web for other great content, including productions that we created
through the collaboration of USDA-ARS and Utah State University.
[Bees buzzing]