Author Gary Taylor ◦
Just a quick one…gonna try real hard not to get side-tracked this time… just the facts… I try not to post the same bee more than a couple of times and that the last one was an exception ‘cos it was “new” beehaviour to me… I’m putting on Meroglossa rubricata (or “Ruby” as I call her)…. bubbling in her nest…
Now I’d reckon most of you’d know what “bubbling” is, but for the newbees who don’t, bubbling is the term given to the process of repetitively regurgitating ingested nectar into a bubble in order to evaporate the water content out and condense the liquid into a more compact (so you can fit more in), much richer energy source… And I do have other pics of rubricata bubbling, but not in her nest, so I’m playing the “new” behaviour card again…
“Click-click” goes the sound of a revolver being cocked under the table… “You’ve already played that card… yer a lyin’ cheatin’ varmint!..” then “Ptunk” as a spit of chawin’ tobaccy hits the side of a spittoon and dribbles down onto the sawdust floor…
(Facts Please! Facts!) Yeah I’m getting there… So! Before you leave me with a belly full of lead, I have two more cards to play, second and third pics… not much on their own and look pretty much the same in this post but if I’ve got the right two pics you should be able to click on either pic and arrow back and forth between the two to get an idea of the inward-outward action of the bubble blowing… 🙂
Just to make it easier… we have pop the last two pics into a video… enjoy
Check out the other blogs in this Meroglossa rubricata series:
an awesome “Commando roll” | Ruby… bubbling | Ruby and the wasp | Party at the nest | red is the weakest, the first to fade in low light | A white bubble
See our Fauna section on Bees for more info on our gorgeous Meroglossa rubricata.
Footnote & References
- Blogs by Gary Taylor, Images © Gary Taylor