Green-winged bamboo-carpenter
The green-winged bamboo-carpenter is a big, shiny black bee from Southeast Asia. People often think it is a bumblebee. It is a carpenter bee, which means it chews a long tunnel into bamboo to make its home.
How fast is it?
Fun facts
It chews into bamboo with its jaws while its body shakes. It does not eat the wood, it uses the bits to build walls between the rooms of its nest.
Its eggs are huge compared with the mother, some of the biggest eggs of any insect.
A mother and up to seven of her daughters can share one nest.
To keep other bees out, a female blocks the door of her nest with her head.
Most asked questions about Green-winged bamboo-carpenter
?Is it a bumblebee?
No. It looks like one, but it is a carpenter bee that makes its nest inside bamboo.
?What does the green-winged bamboo-carpenter eat?
Nectar and pollen from many kinds of flowers. It also feeds its babies with pollen and nectar.
For bug experts
- Scientific name
- Xylocopa nasalis
- Group
- Bees and bumblebees
- Family
- Apidae
- Classification
- Insecta > Hymenoptera > Apidae
- Lives on
- Asia
- Also known as
- Oriental carpenter bee
Where the facts come from
- Xylocopa nasalis (Wikipedia, CC BY-SA 4.0): what it looks like, where it lives, what it eats, sizes and fun facts, retold in simple words.
- Picture by Francisco G. Gonzálvez (one of researchers in Flowers attract weaver ants that deter less effective pollinators ). CC BY-SA 3.0, Wikimedia Commons. The sticker of this bug is drawn from this picture.
If we got something wrong, sorry, we are bug fans, not a science journal. Tell us at [email protected] and we will fix it.
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