In a message dated 95-06-01 20:16:13 EDT, Doug Yanega wrote:
 
>When you talk about solitary bees, are you talking about small
>generalist
>species like halictids, or the large southeastern cucurbit
>specialists like
>Peponapis and Xenoglossa? Seems to me it wouldn't take more than a
>handful
>of the latter bees to pollinate a LOT of cucurbits. I don't think,
>though,
>that any other than Xenoglossa strenua have been recorded from
>Florida, and
>there probably only in northern Florida. Heck, maybe that's why
>Georgia
>does so well in comparison - not because there are honeybees, but
>because
>the native cucurbit specialists (which all fly before sunrise, so no
>one
>would ever see them on their crops) are present there? Get a few of
>those
>Georgia melon farmers out there around 4 or 5 AM and find out...maybe
>they
>don't need to spend money on honeybees at all! (Yeah, I know, I'm
>like a
>broken record about how native bees can do anything Apis can do, and
>more -
>but I honestly believe it).
 
   I've been in several watermelon fields before 5 am, and I haven't seen any
solitary bees.  Heck, the blossoms aren't open yet!
 
   On one farm where I was checking the quality of watermelons, I noticed a
strange looking big yellow blossom with a black center out in the field a
ways.  It was a volunteer squash from the previous season, and it was the
only blossom open.  The dark center was about 20 honeybees all jammed in,
with more homing in on it.  It was just getting light in the east at that
time.  You can see why I love my bees.  One blossom open in a hundred acres,
and WHAM!  They all hit it at once.  NO watermelons blossoms were open.
 
   I think my bees do a darn good job!
 
   I won't take offense at your position, but you frustrate me in one sense.
 If the solitary bees are so good, why aren't we raising them?  They sure are
rare around here.
 
   I usually see some large solitary bees (looks like a cross between a
honeybee and a horsefly) on cukes, and that is the only place I've seen them,
but they are entirely absent so far this year.  The only bee other than a
honeybee that I've seen this year on cukes is a very tiny one, - maybe 2-3
mm, and very few at that.  I am sorry I am not yet good at identifying
species, though I am going to try to learn more of them this season.
 
   I would be glad to try raising some, but I am far from university
libraries (if there is any cultural info there).  I have encouraged you to
give me some info, on this, but none has been forthcoming.  How about it?
 Trade secrets?
 
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Dave Green   PO Box 1215, Hemingway, SC   29554