I have not found anything about sizes in books and web sites. I will continue looking into this. For visual comparison between mason bee, cuckoo wasp and sweat bees, bugguide.net is good.
Guest
12-Nov-2008 03:39
Aren't most mason bees bigger?
You can go see my crappy photos that Dr. Bogran from A&M IDed as a cuckoo wasp. My junk is on webshots, same as my email address. I'm embarrassed to have you see them.
Cuckoo wasps are very interesting to watch. At the Nature Center they are always trying to get into the mud daubers nests.
I have been looking into the ID of this photo and do not think it to be either the sweat bee or cuckoo wasp. I now think it is a mason bee.
I will keep looking into this.
Thanks again
pt
09-Nov-2008 03:28
This looks like a cuckoo wasp. They parasitize bees and other wasps by laying their eggs in other wasps' (and bees') nests so that the cuckoo bee larvae can steal the food of from the original larvae. The underside of the cuckoo wasp's abdomen is concave so that it can roll up into a little ball as a defense mechanism to protect itself from getting stung if it gets caught laying its eggs in other folks' nests.
I love these little guys--they're like miniature flying jewels. They hang out at the tiny white flowers (especially) mint in my garden.
Great photo. I like how you got him curled up and clinging to the flower; he's so shiny it almost looks like there's a reflection on him. I can even see through his wings. I like the contrast of the little fuzzy tufts against the smooth metallic body. His great big eyes remind me of a skipper. He's got a lot of personality.
