Bicolored Striped Sweat Bee (Agapostemon virescens) lives in open fields across Eastern North America. It feeds on nectar and pollen.
Fascinating facts about the Bicolored Striped Sweat Bee
- Toronto's official pollinator isn't a honeybee at all, it's the bicolored striped sweat bee, Agapostemon virescens. This tiny native buzzes across North America, but in Canada it earned the civic title of "official bee of the city of Toronto." Unlike solitary bees that dig alone, A. virescens builds communal underground nests where several females share a single burrow, creating dense family clusters beneath the soil.
- Sub-lethal doses of common auxin-mimic herbicides can slash the pollen. When dicamba was applied at just 1/100 × the labeled rate (5.60 g ae ha-1), soybean plants produced 31% fewer flowers and pods, and pollen grains per anther fell 25% compared with untreated controls. Florpyrauxifen-benzyl at 0.30 g ha-1 cut reproductive organs by 27% and pollen by 18%.
- Agapostemon virescens belongs to the Halictidae family, the group commonly called sweat bees. The Wikipedia entry notes it is and the Animal Diversity Web classifies it under This taxonomic placement tells us the bee shares traits like ground-nesting habits with its relatives.
- Passive pan-trap surveys can reveal hidden bee diversity, and a recent cotton-field study captured 66 Hymenoptera species across four families. The authors wrote they and concluded that offering a low-cost tool to monitor its abundance and inform conservation in agro-ecosystems.
Sources
Every fact above was checked against these pages, and kept only where one of them states it.
At a glance
RangeEastern North America
HabitatOpen fields
DietNectar and pollen
About the Bicolored Striped Sweat Bee
In the warm, golden light of a summer's day, the Bicolored Striped Sweat Bee dances through the air, its iridescent stripes glimmering like polished jewels as it flits from bloom to bloom. With a mesmerizing agility, it navigates the intricate landscape of petals and leaves, its delicate form belied by a fierce industry as it gathers nectar and pollen for its nest. As it moves, its very presence seems to embody the vibrant, pulsing heartbeat of the natural world, a tiny but vital thread in the intricate tapestry of life.
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