Carpenter bees are the largest species of wild bees native to us. What is characteristic is their bumblebee-like, black appearance and their loud humming. In the following, we would like to take a look at what makes the funny fellows so interesting and unique in their way of life.
Is a carpenter bee dangerous?
Carpenter bees are not dangerous. They are protected. They settle in a garden with a bee hotel, with nectar-rich flowers or in dead wood. Even if the carpenter bee is peaceful, it can sting. It is an important member of the ecosystem and takes on the role of plant pollinator.
Blue, black or large carpenter bee
Many names, one bee: Behind the names “Blue Carpenter Bee”, “Black Carpenter Bee”, “Blue Black Carpenter Bee” or “Large Carpenter Bee” there is the same species of bee: the Xylocopa. It has a black body and blue wings and is significantly larger than its striped relatives, which is why all the names are quite accurate.
Can carpenter bees sting?
Carpenter bees can sting like any other species of bee. However, they do this extremely rarely and only when they feel really threatened. Carpenter bees are solitary insects and are very shy and therefore not very dangerous. If you have had the rare misfortune of being stung by a carpenter bee, treat the sting like any other bee or wasp sting:
- Remove the stinger
- rub a slice of raw onion on the bite
- cool the stitch
- A paste made from baking soda and water disinfects and cools
- Essential oils such as clove oil, mint oil or lavender oil disinfect and reduce itching
Excursus
Fighting carpenter bees
Carpenter bees are rare solitary creatures and not dangerous. Even if you think you have to protect your wooden roof from carpenter bees, you can relax: carpenter bees only nest in rotten, soft wood. So there is no reason to fight carpenter bees.
Usefulness of carpenter bees
Why carpenter bees are on the Red List of the Federal Agency for Nature Conservation is, of course, primarily due to their declining population. Stopping this is a requirement of general biodiversity, which is necessary in the long term for a balanced ecological macrosystem.
For many protected species, their immediate usefulness is highlighted - this can ultimately motivate more private individuals with gardens to help protect the species in question.
Of course, the carpenter bee is also an important link in the ecosystem. Like all bees, it also takes on a role as a plant pollinator - but this is only moderately pronounced, because carpenter bees have the habit of acting as so-called nectar robbers. They have the habit of extracting nectar from some plant flowers without paying anything in return: Because they are equipped with strong mandibles, which they are used to building nests, they sometimes simply bite through particularly deep, hard-to-reach flowers - the pollination effect remains if necessary, completely on the route.
Normally, carpenter bees carry out their pollination task when collecting nectar very well. Because of their long tongue, they are particularly specialized in basket plants, butterflies and mint plants. Large carpenter bees like to fly to the labial flowers of clary sage or the butterfly flowers of wisteria. They don't have to pierce the base of the flowers, so they pollinate the beautiful garden plants diligently. It's nice to see it here:
Holzbiene am Muskatellersalbei
How do you deal with carpenter bees?
Given the threat to species, you should generally welcome carpenter bees in your garden. It is certainly not necessary to drive them away - even if their large, black and loudly humming presence can be a bit strange at first. The animals are by no means particularly dangerous or even harmful.
In view of the rather poor supply of suitable habitat across the country, it is commendable if you make an effort to offer the animals a home. You can do this in various ways. Above all, it makes sense to create space for possible nesting sites. For example, through the following measures:
- Don't clean up dead wood meticulously
- Create a bee hotel if necessary
Leave dead wood in the garden
If you have an old tree in your garden that is not at risk of falling over soon and does not disturb you too much visually, you should leave it standing if possible. It not only offers carpenter bees a wonderful basis for building their nesting tunnels, but also a variety of livelihoods for other insect, mammal and bird species.
Since carpenter bees are also very loyal to their location, an old tree in particular offers them an excellent place to live that they can use again and again. You can also closely observe the amazing, eager drilling activity of individual carpenter bees on the trunk.
Leaving other dead wood, such as broken, rotten branches, is of course also worthwhile for housing carpenter bees. In order not to make the look of the garden too rude, you can also cleverly arrange individual, shapely old branches on the edges of flower beds or on the banks of a garden pond.
Bee Hotel
A bee hotel looks pretty and attracts many beneficial insects to the garden
If you maintain a somewhat tidier garden style and would like to maintain it, we recommend creating an insect or specific bee hotel. You can design this so that other useful bees also have nesting opportunities in it. For carpenter bees, the bee hotel should of course be equipped with as much solid, but rotten, old wood as possible. Older branch slices can also look very decorative with distinctive annual rings and larger cracks. The carpenter bees also find good places to start their drilling in the cracks.
But carpenter bees also like to use plant stems filled with solid pith or hollow ones as nesting sites. Stems of Japanese knotweed, reed or bamboo are recommended. Depending on the size of the carpenter bees, the cross section of the stems should be about 5-9 mm. If you have had carpenter bees living in your garden for a long time, you can also use a hole in an old nesting site as a guide when cross-sectioning any plant stems. Some other wild bee species also feel very comfortable in plant stems.
The genus of carpenter bees
The carpenter bees, zoologically known as Xylocopa, are one of three genera within the true bee family. They are therefore closely related to honey bees from the genus Apinae.
Their scientific and translated name, as is often the case with names of animal species, comes from their way of life:. They use their powerful mouthparts to bore holes in tree branches and rotten trunks, but sometimes also in wooden parts of human structures such as fence posts.
How much wood they remove when building their long tunnels can be seen from the wood chips that are created under their nesting areas. In areas where they are more numerous, they are sometimes fought because of their wood-boring activity.
Taxonomy and occurrence
The genus of carpenter bees includes a total of around 500 species within 31 subfamilies worldwide. Most of them live in tropical and subtropical areas because the animals are extremely warm-loving. Only 8 species have adapted to European climatic conditions, and only 3 species have settled in Central Europe. As the climate continues to warm, carpenter bees can be seen more and more frequently in our local gardens, even if they are generally rare. Carpenter bees have spread noticeably, particularly in southern federal states such as Baden-Württemberg, Rhineland-Palatinate, Saarland, Bavaria and Hesse.
Excursus
Pigeontail
General global warming has also paved the way for other large insect species to reach our Central European latitudes: to a similar extent to carpenter bees, pigeontails, for example, have also become significantly more present here in recent years. Not only is the name of the large butterfly more reminiscent of a small bird than an insect, but also its appearance: because of its wingspan of a good 4 centimeters, its white-patterned rear and its mobile whirring flight, standing on flowers, it moves back and forth almost a bit similar to a hummingbird.
The pigeontail is becoming more and more common in our latitudes
Appearance
Carpenter bees are relatively easy to distinguish from other real bees or wild bees. One of the most obvious distinguishing features is their coloring, which is not black and yellow like some other real bees that laypeople consider to be typical: rather, a deep black coloring is characteristic of most species of carpenter bees, often accompanied by shimmering metallic nuances in blue to purple on the body and wings.
The stature also differs significantly from honey bees or other bee species: carpenter bees have an unusually large and stocky body structure, which is similar to that of bumblebees. (by the way, bumblebees are also real bees)
Lifestyle
Carpenter bees have a one-year cycle that differs in some aspects from that of other solitary bees. First of all, it is unusual that both females and drones hibernate in carpenter bees. To do this, individually or in groups, they look for a place protected from wind, rain and cold, such as a self-dug hole in the ground or a crack in a wall or wood. The old nest is also sometimes used as winter quarters.
The new carpenter bee year begins in April. Then, after awakening from hibernation, females and drones come together to mate. The female then begins to create a nesting site individually. To do this, it drills breeding tubes into older, but still relatively solid wood and sets up around 10 to 15 breeding chambers in them. An egg is placed in each of them and provided with a provision package. This consists of a mixture of pollen, nectar and head gland secretion. Finally, the brood chambers prepared in this way are closed and the larvae are left to their own devices.
The larvae develop independently with the provisions provided. After about 2 months they pupate and become fully carpenter bees within a few days. As such, they eat their way out of their wooden breeding chamber and can begin their lives as adults.
The females live relatively long compared to other solitary bees. After overwintering, they often live into the summer and can watch the development of their offspring. After they have hatched, a kind of shared flat share between generations is sometimes even formed.
Here is another small, overview-like profile of the carpenter bees:
| Zoological classification | Appearance | Occurrences | Lifestyle | Special identifying features |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| Belong to the family of true bees within the partial order of stinging wasps and the suborder of waist wasps | Compared to other types of real bees, their body is quite large and stocky like a bumblebee (14 to 28 mm long), their color is strikingly deep black, often covered with a metallic shimmer in blue to violet | In Central Europe only 3 species are represented, these mainly in southern to southeastern countries, in German-speaking countries especially in Switzerland, Austria and Germany in federal states such as Baden-Württemberg, Bavaria, Saxony, | Solitary lifestyle, i.e. living alone, no formation of states, one-year cycle, females and drones both overwinter | large, deep black, corpulent appearance, loud humming noise when flying |
This video shot by Nabu Thuringia gives an impression of the carpenter bee and its way of life:
Die Blaue Holzbiene
Identify carpenter bee species
Great carpenter bee (Xylocopa violacea)
The large carpenter bee, zoologically known as Xylocopa violacea, has several secondary names that quickly suggest its own species. In fact, the blue carpenter bee, the blue-black carpenter bee, the violet-winged carpenter bee and the common carpenter bee can be placed in a pot labeled 'large carpenter bee' or'Xylocopa violacea' can be thrown. The species is sometimes even called the black hornet because its body size and dark coloring are somewhat reminiscent of its larger relatives from the subfamily of real wasps.
The key identifying features of the large carpenter bee are already defined with the color-denoting secondary names: their wings are actually crossed by shimmering blue to violet veins. Their abdomen is deep black, rounded like a bumblebee and has dense, short hair. The middle segment of the body, the thorax, is somewhat lighter and has a bluish-greyish tone. Overall, large carpenter bees – as their main name suggests – reach quite an impressive size. They can be up to 28 millimeters long.
(Xylocopa iris)
This type of carpenter bee, like the large carpenter bee, is one of the few species that are also widespread in Central Europe. It is found primarily in the Mediterranean region, but is also represented in the near southeast and Central Asia. Specimens have also been found in certain regions of Switzerland and Austria. In Germany it occurs, if at all, in the south.
With a body length of 14 to 16 millimeters, the Xylocopa iris remains significantly smaller than the large carpenter bee, but its stature is similarly stocky and bumblebee-like. Her entire body is deep black, her abdomen shimmers slightly in a metallic, sometimes greenish blue.
Eastern carpenter bee (Xylocopa valga)
The Xylocopa valga has long, black antennae
The species Xylocopa valga is known in German as the eastern or black-feel carpenter bee. It is the third (and last) species to occur in central Europe. It is particularly widespread in southern to southeastern Central European countries such as Italy, Slovenia, Romania, Serbia and Greece. In Germany, the eastern carpenter bee has been recorded sporadically in Baden-Württemberg, Bavaria and Saxony.
In its appearance it resembles the large carpenter bee in certain aspects, in particular it has a similarly thick, bumblebee-like and black colored abdomen and, like the Xylocopa violacea, reaches a total length of up to 28 millimeters. A characteristic feature, which is also recorded in one of the common names of this species, are the striking and consistently deep black antennae. The wings are black with a metallic, bluish sheen.
Other species that occur in Europe:
The following species of carpenter bees are not represented directly in Germany, but in the wider European area, especially in the Balkans:
- Xylocopa cantabrita
- Xylocopa amedaei
- Xylocopa gracilis
- Xylocopa olivieri
- Xylocopa uclesiensis
Interesting to know:
Of these “non-German” carpenter bee species, some have a somewhat more typical bee appearance to our eyes. The Xylocopa cantabrita and the ylocopa olivieri, for example, have a similar black and yellow striped coloring to that of honey bees instead of metallic black. However, the striped pattern is usually not so pronounced and the colors turn a little more brownish-reddish. Their body structure is also carpenter bee-like corpulent and large with a length of around 18 to 22 millimeters.
The Xylocopa cantabrita occurs primarily on the Spanish peninsula and is therefore also commonly called the Spanish carpenter bee.
Situation of carpenter bees here
The question of how our carpenter bees are doing is of course justified in times of increasingly urgent species protection. In view of the general decline in plant and animal species diversity, we are also taking a close look at the situation of carpenter bees.
The matter is actually double-edged. On the one hand, the carpenter bee is one of the endangered species threatened with extinction in this country. In particular, the large carpenter bee, which is most common in our region, is listed on the so-called Red List of the Federal Agency for Nature Conservation. So she has been under careful observation for a long time.
The decline in carpenter bee species here is primarily due to the lack of suitable habitat. As we have already learned, carpenter bees prefer dead wood for nesting. However, the many overly tidy gardens in this country offer little of this, and even in the agricultural and forestry sectors, more and more area is no longer left to chance or to nature. Dead wood that is simply left lying around is a rarity, but it is an important source of life for carpenter bees and many other small animal species.
On the other hand, a certain recent spread of the species can also be observed: because the summers are getting hotter and the winters are getting milder, heat-loving insect species carpenter bees are penetrating further and further into northern regions. Despite their increased occurrence in the southern parts of the country, you may also see one or two carpenter bees in northern German areas such as Brandenburg, North Rhine-Westphalia or Lower Saxony.
There has to be something else in there. woodbee woodbee blue blue black black sweet peas noblevetch pink insect insect natur nature
A post shared by Katharina (@rabe_haug) on Jul 14, 2019 at 6:55am PDT
Frequently asked questions
Can carpenter bees be dangerous?
Given their size, mysterious black coloring and loud buzzing, carpenter bees don't seem entirely kosher to some gardeners. Of course also because the sight of them is still rather rare and almost a bit more exotic.
In general, carpenter bees belong to the less dangerous genera within the true bee family. This is simply due to their solitary, solitary, lifestyle. Basically, solitary stinging insects have less reason to sting because the defense of a state is no longer a defensive situation. Socially living species, i.e. those that form large colonies, such as German wasps, hornets or honey bees, have to protect an entire colony in order to preserve the species and therefore simply have more surface area to attack.
Solitary species such as carpenter bees, on the other hand, only rely on their stingers when they are attacked as individuals, for example when foraging for food. It is therefore quite rare for them to sting. The secretion in their stinger is no more toxic than that of honey bees. To avoid a sting, you should leave a carpenter bee alone if possible and not harass it.
Are carpenter bees protected or endangered?
The large carpenter bee has “specially protected” status in Germany according to the Federal Nature Conservation Act. Interfering with, catching or killing carpenter bees is therefore prohibited and will be prosecuted.
So approach the animals carefully! Instead of driving them away, you would rather create the living conditions that are increasingly being taken away from them in the wild by designing your garden in a natural way, leaving dead wood and, if necessary, building a nesting aid.
