A Personal Favourite.

The fabulous Red-tailed Bumblebee Bombus lapidarius, is a particular favourite of mine.It is a common bumblebee and nests in a hole in the ground,sometimes under stones or at the base of a dry stone wall,hence their other common name the Stone Bumblebee.The queen pictured below emerges from hibernation in March.When the similar but much smaller workers hatch from the nest they take over pollen collecting duties while the queen concentrates on laying more eggs.An individual nest can have up to 200 bees and later in the year the males emerge.Only the newly hatched queens survive at the end of the season to hibernate and  create a colony the next spring.