Red-shanked bumble bee

The queen is the biggest: about 17 millimetres long, with wings 32 millimetres across.

It often moves into an old mouse nest and builds its own nest from grass or moss on the ground.

One nest usually has 50 to 100 worker bees.

In the eastern Pyrenees mountains it is so common that more than half of all the bumblebees there are this kind.

In Ireland it has become very rare and is an endangered species.