Andrena vicina, f, face, Hardy Co., WV

Ah, Andrena vicina one of several Andrena or mining bees that feed their babies almost entirely the pollen of blueberries. This large, honey bee sized Andrena is noteworthy for the dark pollen carrying hairs on its legs. It, and other blueberry bees when alighting upon the blueberry flower sing a song of just the right frequency to shake the pollen out of the pores of the specialized anther tubes. Songs that honey bees and other species don't know to sing. Tricky plants. Tricky Bees. Picture by the newly trained Sydney Price. Photography Information: Canon Mark II 5D, Zerene Stacker, Stackshot Sled, 65mm Canon MP-E 1-5X macro lens, Twin Macro Flash in Styrofoam Cooler, F5.0, ISO 100, Shutter Speed 200 USGSBIML Photoshopping Technique: Note that we now have added using the burn tool at 50% opacity set to shadows to clean up the halos that bleed into the black background from "hot" color sections of the picture.