Learning & Sharing Their Names

Sunday Shares #42
Today’s Being of the Day: Common Eastern Bumble Bee

Scientific name: Bombus impatiens
Common name: Common eastern bumble bee

A species of Bumble bee
Genus: Bombus
Family: Apidae
Order: Hymenoptera
Class: Insecta
Phylum: Arthropoda
Kingdom: Animalia
Domain: Eukaryota

Although most pollinator species are under threat, the Eastern bumble bee is categorized as least concern by the IUCN. The Eastern Bumble Bee is a pollinator of tomatoes, blueberries, cucumbers and numerous other fruit and vegetable crops vital to humans and other species that require buzz pollination.

The fur all over their body collects and traps pollen, carrying it from one bloom to another as they drink nectar. The abdomen, head and legs have black hair. The thorax has yellow hair. Near the waist, a yellow hair band is also seen and they have a shiny black bald spot on their heads. Pollen grains are stored in pollen baskets on their legs. Once full, the bee must return the pollen to the colony where it is fed to the larvae.

Their range expands the whole North American East coast. Introduced to the western coast and other countries so as to help pollinate crops, its range is expanding. The invasiveness and threat level to other species in those countries is still under study.

One of the first pollinators to appear in the spring and one of the last to die in the fall, the Eastern bumble bee is hardier then other bumble bees. All but the new queens die in the fall. They hibernate in winter and search for a new nest site in the spring. They most often nest underground in woodland and fields. One nest can have 300-500 individuals. First to develop in the new nest are worker bees, then males and last new queens.

Sources:
Seek App
IUCNredlist.org
Nwf.org
InsectIdentification.org
Bumble Bee GuideEast 2011, fs.fed.us

@ Montreal, Quebec

On today’s Gardening Adventures (with Labrini) - Sowing Seeds

Last week we saw how I prepared my coconut fibre pellets. This week we will see how I use them! 🙌

The first step in sowing seeds is knowing what you want to sow and how many. Not all seeds will sprout and not all seedlings will survive. That’s why I like to sow a bit more seeds so that if not all sprout or not all seedlings do survive, then at least I still have the number of seedlings I was initially going for.

Step 2 is preparing your soil and containers. (See last week’s IGTV for the explanation.)

Step 3 and Step 4 are planting your seeds. Depending on the type of plant, the seeds require different needs. Some seeds need to only be slightly covered by the soil, others a little bit more and others not at all! You don’t want to plant your seeds to deep though because then the sun rays won’t be able to reach it and then they won’t be able to germinate.

Step 5, labelling, is essential. Unless your only planting one type of seed, differentiating between different seedlings can be quite hard since they all have two small leaves. Sure, some seedlings are easier to identify then others but if one does not want to play a guessing game, labelling is surely your friend.

Step 6 is important to assure your seeds get the most amount of sun they can get in a humid/warm enclosed space. I don’t have any grow lights, so my seedlings tend to thin out and stretch. Once I transplant them into bigger containers though I’m hoping they will be much happier.

For the first few days after sowing my seeds I made sure they had enough water. Only after 4-5 days did I need to water them a bit. Once the seedlings started to grow, the transparent cover came off so as not to increase their stretching further.

Wordy Wednesdays #17
Word of the Day: Rhizome

A continuously growing horizontal underground stem which puts out lateral shoots and adventitious roots at intervals.
- OxfordLanguages