Pollen Baskets!

After spending an hour watching the bees today and looking for different pollen colors in their baskets, I began to wonder, “What is a pollen basket?” I imagined a small net attached to the hind leg of the bee. I googled pollen basket and found out.

The hind leg has a “comb” which is made up of tiny hairs that help the bee to collect pollen. She then moistens the pollen with flower nectar and puts this mixture into her basket, a collection of slightly larger hairs above the comb. Who knows what happens to it when the bee gets into the hive?! That's for another day.

Here are some pictures displaying a few of the different colors of pollen we observed in the baskets.

White

Light Yellow

Dark Yellow~Jess