More on Fork-Tailed Flower Bees

I had a super A. furcata watching day in my local wildlife garden today. In a beautiful large patch of flowering Hedge Woundwort (Stachys sylvatica), in the shade, a male (below) kept patrolling, checking every flowering spear visually and darting between them, stopping to feed occasionally.

Two females collected nectar and pollen, at times both together in the same spear. The male came across and pounced a couple of times on a female, but I saw no copulation. Males seem to have a similar patrolling behaviour around favoured flowers as A. plumipes. In my garden it patrols different flowers around it (Iris, Digitalis lutea and D. purpurea). But last year I planted their local native favourite plant, S. sylvatica in a shady corner. Although it is still small, it is now flowering. Something interesting is that these bees do not mind shade or cloudy weather, they will be out and about like bumblebees whatever the weather, so they don't tend to overlap with sun-loving Anthidium manicatum - which has a similar flower choice than them and males aggressively defend territories - so much when they forage. I wonder if they are able to thermoregulate in a similar way than their relative A. plumipes and this allows them to exploit a different niche to other summer bees.

An Anthophora furcata female with legs full of pollen foraging in Stachys sylvatica.