Saving the small things that run the planet
Clover Melitta
Fast Facts
Latin name: Melitta leporina
Notable feature: Stripy abdomen and a high-pitched buzz.
Conservation Status: Least Concern
Where in the UK: Southern England. Scattered records across Wales.
Clover Melitta (Melitta leporina) © Julia Moning (iNaturalist, CC BY 4.0)
The Clover Melitta (Melitta leporina), also known as the Clover Blunt-Horn, is a relatively small, compact bee with bright brown hair and relatively thick brown bands across their abdomen that can fade with age. The high-pitched buzz can be distinctive in the field. Males will zip around their legume food plants at great speeds looking for females.
This solitary bee is widely distributed across open flower-rich grasslands in southern England, but it is relatively rare.
- Size: 11mm
- Life span: 2.5 months
- Diet: Flowers visited include ragworts, thistles, brambles, heathers, thistles and scabiouses
- Reproduction: This bee is a kleptoparasite, the female lays her eggs in the nests of other bees, specifically Melitta species (blunthorn bees). Her eggs will hatch and then eat the pollen collected by the Melitta bee, as well as the Melitta bee’s young.
- When to see: Late June to mid-September.
- Population Trend: Declining generally.
- Threats: The decline of its host genus, Melitta.
- Interesting Fact: These bees look like wasps, but like all bees they have branched hairs which have evolved to collect pollen. Wasps have straight hairs as they are less closely evolved with flowers.
Buglife is helping the recovery of populations of Clover Melitta Bees and other wildlife via our projects and campaigns, including Kernow Wyls – People for Pollinators, Solitary Bee Week and B-Lines, but we need your help!
Buglife B-Lines are an imaginative and beautiful solution to the problem of the loss of flowers and pollinators. B-Lines are a series of ‘insect pathways’ running through our countryside and towns, along which we are restoring and creating a series of wildflower-rich habitat stepping stones. Linking existing wildlife areas together, creating a network, like a railway, that will weave across the UK landscape. More information about B-Lines and how you can help pollinators can be found here.
Join a recording scheme and log your finds – send any records/sightings to BWARS or download the iRecord app and get recording!
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