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Dark-edged Bee-flies

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Edited by Richard Walker, Thursday, 1 Apr 2021, 01:38
My friend Michèle photographed these rather elegant insects sunning themselves.



They're Dark-edged Bee-flies; useful pollinators and harmless to humans, but brood parisites to true bees. They lay eggs in bees' nests and the hatched larvae consume the bee larvae. 'The universe is an ethically troubling place', as someone once said.
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SXR103 chemistry is fun (2008) :-)

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I've noticed a lot of bee flies in my garden this spring, They look like miniature hummingbirds.

I wasn't aware before now that they parasitised bee colonies.

Jan