Path: utzoo!attcan!utgpu!jarvis.csri.toronto.edu!mailrus!ames!uhccux!baron
From: baron@uhccux.uhcc.hawaii.edu (just another peon)
Newsgroups: sci.bio
Subject: Re: Strange Bee-Like Creatures - What Are They?
Message-ID: <5696@uhccux.uhcc.hawaii.edu>
Date: 12 Dec 89 03:12:44 GMT
References: <8216@ttidca.TTI.COM> <1572@uw-nsr.UUCP>
Reply-To: baron@uhccux.UUCP (just another peon)
Distribution: usa
Organization: University of Hawaii
Lines: 23

In article <8216@ttidca.TTI.COM> jackson@ttidca.tti.com (Dick Jackson) writes:
-I pruned our plum tree last weekend and cut off a dead branch about 8 cm
-in diameter. I cut it into log sized chunks and set them down....
-....a black bee-like
-creature emerged and flew around.  It was almost 2 cm long (I would
-estimate) and was almost shapeless (like a large furry raisin).  Later a
-yellow version came out of the log, and flew in ever higher circles till
-it vanished.  The yellow one was thinner and had a definite waist.  We saw
-about four black ones altogether, they mostly stayed on the ground and
-seemed torpid as if they had been hibernating.

these sound a lot like what we call "carpenter bees."  I'm not sure if
they are true bees, or bee-like wasps (sorry, I'm not an entomologist)
but they have barbed stingers like bees.  I don't recall the yellowish-
brown ones ever stinging, and I think we just assumed they were males or
something.  they bore very neat holes in wood approximately the diameter
of their bodies and can be quite a nuisance.


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