Blog by Karen Metz

I am fortunate to have a friend who is a wonderful vegetable gardener.  She generously shares her bounty with my family.  We have had special deliveries to our front porch over several months. We started with kale, winter squash, and beets, and then moved to herbs, zucchini, and eggplant. I’ve had fun looking up recipes to use what shows up on the porch.

One morning I knew she would be dropping some things off, so I wanted to leave something for her.  My lavender was blooming, so I cut some of that. I also placed in a bundle of dried lavender.  I have some beautiful orange and yellow gladiolas that I have been growing in a raised bed for about 15 years. I decided they would be great to add to her package as well.

As I cut the first gladiola stalk, I thought it felt a little heavier than normal.  I looked at it and saw that the bottom blossom looked odd. As I looked closer, I saw there was a large bee inside.  I was so shocked that I nearly dropped the stalk.  I was afraid he was going to wake up and fly out, possibly straight into me.  But he didn’t.  It was early morning, and I did want to continue picking gladiolas.  I decided to break off the bottom blossom and lay it on the edge of the raised bed. I resumed picking flowers and ended up with a nice little parcel for my friend. Later in the day, I checked back, and the blossom was still in the same spot, but the bee had gone.

I remembered that I had read about bees sleeping on flowers in the wonderful blog, Bug Squad, by Kathy Keatley Garvey.  She had seen long-horned bees grouped together sleeping on a flower in the aster family and some bumblebees sleeping by themselves.  I could only see the top of this bee, not the tail end or wings. It did look hairy and bumblebee “ish”, but I am not an entomologist.

In looking through some reference books and on the web, I also found mention of mining bees and squash bees also sleeping on flowers. Generally, bees sleeping on or in flowers are males that are not welcome in the nest.  Many like to sleep on flat flowers like those in the aster family, but some like to sleep in closed-up flowers like California poppies or squash blossoms. I didn’t find any descriptions about bees in gladiola. I can highly recommend 2 resources: California Bees & Blooms: A Guide for Gardeners and Naturalists by Gordon W. Frankie, Robbin W. Thorp, Rollin E. Coville, and Barbara Ertter, and Field Guide to The Common Bees of California in the California Natural History Guides Series by Gretchen LeBuhn, illustrated by Noel B. Pugh.