can anyone recommend a really good (physical book!!) insect field guide for the northeast US? I love bugguide.net but I want something that can help me narrow down for my area specifically. I especially want something with more differentiation between sweat bees other than “sweat bees are a lot of species! sometimes they look like this or this”
I can see with my inexpert eyeballs that I have at least five completely different species (I know I can use iNaturalist for help but it would be satisfying to do a little more myself)
@8ofpentacles good luck!! Sweat bees are so hard. Really most bees are so hard, I'm very confused by the vast array of bee species 😅
@idzie yes!! like I know we have a few bumblebees here, and I /think/ I have at least two or three based on slight size differences, but I don't think I'll ever be able to quite tell them apart (none of them have the handy golden butt fuzz lol)
@8ofpentacles @idzie For bumblebees specifically, this looks like a very promising guide: https://www.bumblebeewatch.org/field-guide/
@8ofpentacles this one looks really good and is supposed to be a replacement for the pterson guide, which seems pretty rad: https://press.princeton.edu/books/paperback/9780691232850/insects-of-north-america
I don't have experience with it but based on the wasp ID page they are showing it has potential. Gonna put it on hold at the library 😊
if you can wait and want some pictures of bee pages i can provide in a few days
@castanea_jo oh that would be SWEET if you don't mind! I'm definitely not in a rush.
So sadly i think you will have to find a bee-specific book, as the last two pictures here are all the bee content in the book. It _does_ seem like a really nice general guide to insect ID
@castanea_jo aw dang haha. definitely still looks like a nice insect reference though, I might still pick it up!
@8ofpentacles @handmade_ghost Not a book, but this website is very helpful for identifying the bees that it covers. Its main flaw is that it's not complete: https://watchingbees.com/
@8ofpentacles maybe @futurebird knows of one? (Even if they don't, their account is well worth a follow!)
@8ofpentacles went to a presentation from the folks at the Oregon Bee Atlas about a month ago, and my favorite phrase they used was "morphologically monotonous" -- a lot of the little bees are virtually indistinguishable to species visually, sometimes even with microscopy.
that being said, I'm always down to learn about a good new field guide!!
@8ofpentacles btw, they also mentioned that during the 9 years they've been doing surveys they've increased the estimated native bee population from around 400 species to over 900!!!
@danielthedaring hhaha holy shit! but yeah god I believe it. I just want to get better at least at the ones that are visually distinguishable!! right now I have All Green, Green Head Stripey Bum (I do already know these two species names but just have forgotten at the moment lol), Shrink-Laser-Zapped Honeybee, What The Fuck How Are You So Small Yellow, and Grayish
@8ofpentacles lolol excellent. I like Tiny and Slim, Tiny and Square-headed, Some Kind of Leafcutter, Antennae Longer than Body, Small Green Probably Mason, Striped in White??, Long Wings (Probably Andrena of Some Kind), Green Head Stripey Body Why Are You Nectaring Like THAT
@8ofpentacles the last, caught in the act: https://mastodon.online/@danielthedaring/115132202557379446
@danielthedaring WHAT ARE THEY DOING
Jul 10, 2026, 4:35 PM@danielthedaring @8ofpentacles I read these as nicknames of guys in a street gang
@8ofpentacles @Moss it also reminds me of the Atavamsaka Sutra, where they list off all the different Bodhisattvas in attendance