Pollen manipulation and related activities and structures in bees of the family Apidae

Abstract

Pollen manipulation is described for all major groups of Apidae, and for comparative purposes, other bees are also considered.In prototypic pollen collecting, pollen is removed from the front legs and head, and carried in the crop.In eutypic pollen collecting, it is removed from the front and mid legs as well as surfaces of the head and thorax and transferred by the middle legs to the scopa on the hind legs.Different derived or metatypic types of pollen manipulation supplement the eutypic behavior and provide for transfer of pollen to the abdominal scopa in the Megachilidae and from the abdomen to the hind tibiae in the Apidae.In Apidae the brushy scopa of many other bees is modified into a corbicular scopa, which with the hind tibial surface forms the corbicula.Corbicular filling (= pollen packing) can be