Bumble Bee

Yesterday my friend, Barb, visited the Prospect Gardens and photographed this red-belted bumble bee (Bombus rufocinctus, according to Barb) nectaring on Joe-Pye-Weed.  She thinks it is a male because of having a third red segment on its abdomen. I would never have known. Barb also reports that the bee was not gathering pollen as the females do. Another fact that I did not know. Barb entered the handsome male on Bumble Bee Watch. Thanks, Barb, for sharing.

Here's an Emily Dickinson poem about this visitor to the Prospect Gardens:

Like trains of cars on tracks of plush
I hear the level bee:
A jar across the flowers goes,
Their velvet masonry

Withstands until the sweet assault
Their chivalry consumes,
While he, victorious, tilts away
To vanquish other blooms.

His feet are shod with gauze,
His helmet is of gold;
His breast, a single onyx
With chrysoprase, inlaid.

His labor is a chant,
His idleness a tune;
Oh, for a bee's experience
Of clovers and of noon!