Male long-horned bee roost

[Lisa Millbank]

This evening we noticed a group of 6 male long-horned bees sleeping on a sunflower, with one clinging to another male and another one peeping out from behind a ray flower.  We think they're in the genus Melissodes, but we aren't sure about that.  Males congregate in groups of up to 20 to roost, they hold onto the vegetation with their mandibles and then use their legs to groom themselves before becoming still for the rest of the night.  I was reading about a scientist who marked sleeping males, and then learned that they returned to the same roosting spot night after night. 

Females don't have extremely long antennae like the males do, and each female sleeps in her own nest in the soil. 

Lisa Millbank

[Paul Schlegelmann]

Lisa, wonderful photo and info.  Thanks for sharing!