u/kaphytar

Chonk in a zucchini flower ❤️

I posted in July about a bumblebee who had injured her wing. After she passed some weeks later, two more flightless bumblebees were found crawling on my yard and as the retirement home was already set, got housed there.

I just felt like writing a few words of them :) I didn't expect each of them have so distinct characteristics!

Pörri I had so much energy, she stomped around like the ground beneath her feet was a direct insult to her existence. Strong, even with only 1.5 wings she almost got herself airborne, 5 of the 6 feets sometimes and unfortunately spent a lot of time bumbling down things due to that, especially because the one side of her wings worked perfectly.

Pörri II junior was very wobbly to begin with, and she was more anxious. Any sudden approach would result in a middle finger... leg, so I tried to let her bee as much as possible, though in her last days she didn't mind parking on my hand, probably for warmth.

Pörri II senior was a very smol bumble and liked to hide or dig into mulch. She was the most calm of the three and if she was out and about when I went to check on them, it was possible to carry her to new flowers to give more variety than their retirement home allowed. She passed this morning and I blame myself and the two daddy long legs that I found from the box. I don't know if they bite their prey, but they definitely had nefarious intent and even if I moved Pörri II senior to a new box and she was still alive, I found her dead this morning.

I was not prepared for how bad I felt, looking after creatures who should be flying and buzzing around to be ground tied. All of them wanted to fly, and with especially Pörri II junior and senior who both had either worse damage or wing issues from birth where the rear wings were acting independently of the fore wing, that meant cycles of grooming and I think trying to arrange the wings, then attempting to fly and repeating because their wings betrayed them.

May they now fly to the largest flower in the sky.

Pörri I on the pink strawberry flower

Pörri II senior exploring the sugar water q-tip

Pörri II junior stealing warmth

Probably on her way to better flower beds

Location: Finland

The wings look darker imo and the yellow band on the back body is not full.

I'm unsure if it has the pollen baskets or not because I'm not good with bee details yet.

Early this summer, I noticed bumblebees flying into my wall and when observing the bees on the porch nearby and in my garden, I mainly saw tree bumblebees (B. Hypnorums) which are called (literal translation) manor house bumblebees in my local language because they nest in buildings. Well apparently my house wasn't up to their standards because today as I went to capture their arrivals to the nest, I realised that those are buff or white tailed bumblebees. Aren't those usually ground nesters 🤔

I guess I gotta add some marble columns to update the place to have more manor-like vibe. At least my porch dahlias are fancy enough for the hypnorums.

Few days ago I posted about finding a bumble with an injured wing :/ I was travelling for couple of days so could originally only put her to a kinda bare minimum box with sugar water, picked flowers and instructions for husband to take her new flowers every day.

Today I was able to update her space with a bit larger box and few live flowers after taking inspiration from the few others who are also currently looking after an injured bumble.

Hi,

This bumble was climbing my planter and she cannot fly. She tries but one of her wings seems to be either missing or underdeveloped. I lifted her to my strawberry flower and she seemed hungry.

Is this caused by a virus? I have a nest of different bumblebees in my wall, so if this is virus borne, is having her in my (tiny) 'greenhouse' a significant risk for the other nest? (She was anyway on my yard where the other bumbles hang out so.) So far I have not seen the other bumbles go to the greenhouse.

She's now there in a plastic box with bark mulch(?) and some flowers+sugar water. She seemed pretty agitated :/ walking and buzzing around the box but did eventually go under a flower. Anything else I should do for her?

And pollen pants

Bought a queen bumblebee plush+ two workers for her and captured some slow-mo bumblers because their planter was full of red-tailed bumblebees. (And a couple of what I believed to be either bombus lucorum or terrestis.)

Also...

Did I really capture that bee pooping mid-flight?! (Meh, just checked after posting and it got compressed too much to see it on phone screen 😭 if anyone is checking on computer, around 17 secs is what I wonder.)

I love how she grabs the stamens and *shakes*.

I'm sorry about the horrible traffic noises, but I believe I hear a high bzzz bzzz bzz above it when the bee is in the flower. Is that bumblebee using buzz pollination?

She was working so hard

May not be a chonkerbee but cute and fluffy nevertheless

Why so huggable?

This is my 3rd attempt to post this, shall we finally get a butt on screen.

What I really love about chonky bumblebees is how they bend even the sturdy plants :D 🐝🐝🐝