The Life of Animals | Carpenter bee | In Several species, Females live alongside the daughters or sisters Their Own, creating a sort of social group. They use wood bits to form partitions Between the cells in the nest. A few species bore holes in wood Dwellings. In the United States, there are two eastern species, Xylocopa virginica, and Xylocopa micans, and three other species are primarily western in That distribution, varipuncta Xylocopa, Xylocopa Xylocopa californica and tabaniformis orpifex.
Males of some species have a white or yellow face, where the Females do not; males also have much larger eyes Often than the Females, the which relates to Their mating behavior. Male bees are Often seen hovering near nests, and will approach nearby animals. Female carpenter bees are capable of stinging, but They are docile and rarely sting unless caught in the hand or otherwise directly Provoked. The exact nature of the relationship is not fully Understood, though in other bees That carry mites, the mites are beneficial, feeding either on fungi in the nest, or on other, harmful mites Carpenter bees are solitary bees Traditionally Considered, though some species have simple social nests in the which mothers and daughters may cohabit.
Carpenter bees the make nests by tunneling into wood, vibrating Their bodies as They rasp Their mandibles against the wood, each nest having a single entrance the which may have many adjacent tunnels. Carpenter bees do not eat wood. The provision Masses of some species are Among the most complex in shape of any group of bees; whereas most bees fill Their Brood cells with a soupy mass, and others form simple spheroidal pollen Masses, Xylocopa form elongate and carefully sculpted Masses That Several projections have the which keep the bulk of the mass from coming into contact with the cell walls, resembling an irregular caltrop Sometimes.
Species in the which the males have large eyes are characterized by a mating system where the males either search for Females by patrolling, or by hovering and waiting for passing Females, whom Pursue They then. The pheromone advertises the presence of the male to Females.
