Bee ID: Honey Bees, Bumble Bees and Bee Look-Alikes

• Diet differs: bees collect pollen and nectar, while wasps hunt and prey on other insects.
• Nest material differs: social wasps chew wood into pulp to build paper nests; the honey bee source describes bees as cavity nesters rather than paper-nest builders.
• Sting behavior differs: an individual honey bee can only sting once, while social wasps can sting repeatedly when threatened.
• Temperament differs: spring honey bee swarms are described as extremely docile and unlikely to sting unless provoked, versus wasps/yellowjackets that come into conflict with people while foraging.

People most often mix bees up with:

• Wasps/Hornets/Yellowjackets

Open the other page and compare its list against the marks above; the differences are usually in the antennae, wings or the way the body is divided.

Only females can sting (the stinger is a modified egg-laying structure); a small proportion of people are allergic or hypersensitive to bee/wasp stings. Seek medical care promptly for severe symptoms or any allergic reaction.

Carpenter bees are generally considered beneficial pollinators, even though females bore into wood and can damage structures.

Honey bee nests/hives are found in cavities such as inside walls, chimneys, outbuildings, fences, water meters, utility boxes, barbecue grills, soffits, or under decks.

Get as close as your camera will focus, from directly above, in daylight or a bright lamp. Include the whole body with the legs and antennae in frame; a second shot from the side shows wings and body segments. Put a coin or ruler next to it for scale. For a bite or a bug found on skin or bedding, photograph the bug itself, not the mark. The app names the likely group; use the list above to confirm.

The University of Wisconsin-Madison's pollinator program sorts every bee a volunteer sees into six groups, which is a practical first step for anyone:

• Honey bees: one species. Amber-brown with a striped abdomen.
• Bumble bees: large to very large, 1/2 to 1 inch, with dense hair over the whole body and black and yellow colouring; 20 species in Wisconsin.
• Large dark bees: over 100 species in Wisconsin.
• Small dark bees: over 100 species in Wisconsin.
• Green bees: metallic green; 9 species in Wisconsin.
• Non-bee pollinators: flies and wasps that visit flowers (see the look-alikes below).

Wisconsin alone has over 400 wild bee species. The USDA Forest Service puts native bees at over 4,000 species in the United States, and over 4,400 described species in North America, citing the Pollinator Partnership.

• Colour: amber-brown with a striped abdomen (University of Wisconsin-Madison); Friends of the Earth describes the abdomen as having amber bands or being completely black.
• Hair: a buff-haired thorax (Friends of the Earth) and fewer hairs on the abdomen than a bumble bee (UW-Madison).
• Face: more heart-shaped than a bumble bee's (UW-Madison).
• Hind legs: bare and shiny (Friends of the Earth); foraging females carry pollen in tight balls on them (UW-Madison).
• Colony: a queen, her worker daughters and a few males called drones (USDA Forest Service). Honey bees are imported to North America, not native, and most US colonies live in managed hives (USDA Forest Service; University of Minnesota).

• Hoverflies: very large eyes that sometimes meet in the middle, and short antennae with few segments (Friends of the Earth). UW-Madison adds that flies hover very steadily and have only one pair of wings; bees have two pairs (USDA Forest Service).
• Bee flies: a long, straight proboscis and short antennae; they hover around flowers (Friends of the Earth).
• Social wasps and yellowjackets: a cone-shaped abdomen with yellow stripes and a paper nest (Friends of the Earth); a very pinched waist, little body hair and a bright, shiny body (UW-Madison). See wasps, hornets and yellowjackets.
• Bumble bees: bigger and much hairier all over, with black and yellow colouring (UW-Madison).
• Solitary bees: mining, leafcutter, wool carder and hairy-footed flower bees are all bees but not honey bees (Friends of the Earth); many nest in the ground or in holes. See bee and wasp nest identification.

For bees that may not be native, the Exotic Bee ID tool on IDtools.org (Edition 3, updated November 2021) was built to help people at ports of entry, state agriculture departments and extension services, as well as non-experts. It covers families and genera with non-native species already introduced or likely to arrive in the US, including Apis, Anthidium, Osmia, Ceratina and Megachile, with an "Is this a bee?" section for ruling out look-alikes. If you think you have found an unusual bee, photograph it and contact your state department of agriculture or extension office.