Leaf Cutter Bees

A week or so back I was delighted to see the chewed margins of this pipevine (Aristolochia sp) leaf. Chewing is usually cause for alarm in the garden, but in this case it is evidence of leaf cutter bee activity, something to be welcomed.

A Leaf Cutter Bee Was Here!

The species I see could well be native to Florida. It also could be Megachile rotunda, the "alfalfa bee," imported into the U. S. after the 1930's to: you guessed it! pollinate alfalfa fields. Honeybees are not efficient pollinators of alfalfa. This useful little critter has spread since then to much of the U.S.

The family of leaf cutter bees, Megachilidae, contains at least 2,000 species, and occurs virtually worldwide. Around 63 -75 species can be found in Florida alone. Another common leaf cutter bee, the "mason bee," Osmia sp., constructs its egg chambers with leaves and mud. Osmia bees are produced commercially and can be ordered over the Internet.

The Megachile bee is about the size of a honeybee. It does not sting unless provoked, and the sting is said to be less painful than that of a honeybee. It is somewhat chunky, with black and white bands on the abdomen and black on the upper thorax. Both sexes are generalist pollinators - they like just about everything. Only the female nests. Instead of packing pollen into leg pouches like honeybees, she carries it on the underside of her abdomen.

Megachile on Heliotropium polyphyllum 

She will nest in just about anything the right size and shape - oarlocks, unused hoses, rotten wood, hollow twigs, burrows, or manmade nesting boxes. In Florida the bees also like holes drilled in stucco for fastening hurricane shutters! Nests in underground burrows don't seem to be affected by short-term inundation, or by getting gradually filled in.

Once she has found a suitable nesting place, the female cuts a round bottom plug, and then builds up the chamber with overlapping oval pieces of leaf. She cuts  these sections out of leaf margins one at the time. She works smoothly and precisely, taking only a few seconds. She's so fast that you're lucky to catch her in action. She carries the leaf section slightly curved, under her abdomen, to her nest. I've timed a bee in action, from entrance to exit from burrow.  She takes 60 to 90 seconds to get the new leaf section in place.

Megachile Carrying Oval Leaf Section

When the chamber is complete she packs it with a mixture of nectar and chewed pollen, lays a single egg, and departs to cut the circular seal, or plug. This is when the closely related cuckoo bee. Coelioxys sp., may make her move. She crawls into the nest, and lays her egg, which will hatch and eat both pollen and competing larva.

The  Megachile bee makes a series of chambers, one atop the other. The resulting cylinder is said to resemble a cigar somewhat. It would have to be a cigar no bigger in diameter than a straw. I extracted one from an oarlock one year and kept it in a dish. After a month or so, a faint, persistent buzzing told me that something was happening, and sure enough, one bee, followed quickly by another, emerged. At this point I took the bees and the rest of the cylinder outside where they belonged.

Leaf cutter bees live only a few months. The female dies after she completes her egg-laying. The larva pupates and overwinters in the nest as an adult until it emerges in the spring.

Megachile on Goldenrod

If you're trying to grow a prize rose or dahlia for exhibition, the leaf cutter bee could be a nuisance. Otherwise, since they are solitary, not part of a colony, the damage they do is minimal, and I think just adds interest.

There is a wealth of information on the Internet about leaf cutter bees. The Honeybee Conservancy site has great info, pictures and video. Click the following link to get to the site. leaf cutter bee. The University of Florida also has a good article. Go to edis.ifas.ufl.edu/in619. Another of my favorite sites is from the BeeInformed organization. https://beeinformed.org/2014/07/30/alfalfa-leafcutter-bee-.

Megachile Work on Gopher Apple, Licania michauxii

Honeybees  have the reputation of being the best crop pollinators, but that is not necessarily the case. Our native bees are vital in the pollination of crops, ornamentals and our native flora. I don't know whether the one in my yard is a native or the imported alfalfa bee, but either way it is more than welcome.

Summer Fragrance

One of the things that defines the transition from spring into summer here in the garden is fragrance. It starts with the Gardenia, whose heavy tropical fragrance  envelopes you like humidity, feels liquid enough to drink. Gardenias seem to suggest a seductive beauty, sultry southern nights, the songs of Billie Holiday. Sticking your nose into a gardenia flower and inhaling is near-intoxicating, as "high" as I need to be.


Since gardenias love acid soil, keeping one remotely happy in our alkaline conditions is a constant struggle, and Irma's salty winds set it back even more, but it still bloomed.  Right now it is teetering between permanent decline and slow recovery. Perhaps I should just replace it. The front yard, more protected from salty winds and a little shadier, might be a better location, but the front is crowded already. I would have to redo the area by the front door or dining room window (same area) so that we would be able to enjoy the perfume. Just one of the many landscaping dilemmas one runs into in a  garden, especially one as small as ours.


If the gardenia is like a heavy wine, the frangipani, Plumeria sp., is more like a refreshing sip of lemonade. Plumerias practice deceit pollination. Their light, sweet odor promises nectar, but the flowers don't deliver. Insects, especially the sphinx moth, keep looking for the nectar in vain, thereby transferring pollen.  Traditional Hawaiian leis are made of frangipani blossoms.

Yellow and White Blossoms Are More Frangrant Than Reds and Pinks

Frangipani copes with winter drought and cold by losing all its leaves, and the turgid, lumpy, leaf-scarred stems look dead. The first new growth and the flowers sprout from the very tip of the stems, and have an oddly other-worldly effect when in bud, like some growth out of science fiction.

New Leaves and Flower Buds

Frangipanis typically grow wider than tall. Thanks to Irma, our frangipani is leaning pretty badly. I may try to stake it, or just leave it as is, pretending I'm striving for a more picturesque effect. Before I do anything, I have to remove a mass of Gaillardias, but they're still blooming vigorously.


The flowers of Jamaica caper (Capparis cynophallophora) and 7-year apple ( Genipa clusiifolia) begin opening about the time the gardenia peaks. Just breathing near these 2 shrubs on a warm, late afternoon is a sensuous - even sensual - experience. This is when the white flowers begin serioiusly releasing their fragrance, sending olfactory signals to lure the moths that will pollinate them overnight. They are visited by day-flying insects and butterflies as well, and emit periodic bursts of fragrance throughout the day.

"Morning After" Pink Flowers

When in bloom Jamaica caper is one of our most beautiful native plants. White 4-petaled flowers open in late afternoon or early evening and in the course of the next couple of days morph through a suffused pink to deep maroon before falling. Numerous long stamens whose filaments go through the same color progression as the petals radiate out from the flower's throat, creating a startling beauty.  During the day the flowers can be humming with bees and small flies. I have noticed monarchs nectaring on them as well.

Jamaica Caper in Bloom

The plant's glossy evergreen leaves, which reflect light strongly, make the plant attractive even when it is not in bloom.  Rufino Osorio writes, "The leaves are an extremely dark green .... The effect is hard to describe - the plant appears both dark and bright at the same time." (A Gardener's Guide to Florida's Native Plants, p. 239). Numerous scales give the undersides of the leaves a scurfy appearance. New twigs are cinnammon brown, and older wood is gray.

Jamaica Caper Inflorescence

The seed pod is a brown pod 4 - 8 inches long. The pods on my shrub are more like 3 - 4 inches long. Linnaeus thought they resembled a dog's phallus, hence the species name, cynophallophora. Folks in those days apparantly were less prudish than we are, despite  our foul language, and called things as they saw them. The inside of the seed pod is bright red, and the open pods extend the decorative  phase of the shrub. Cardinals and mockingbirds relish the seeds.

Open Seed Pods

Jamaica caper is an absolutely "cast iron" landscape plant in frost-free areas of Florida once it is established. An inhabitant of coastal hammocks, it is both drought and salt-tolerant. It is untroubled by disease or pests. Occasionally ours shows some light damage from the leaf-rolling larva of some insect. Only  once in the past 20+ years has it become noticeably defoliated, and it recovered quickly and completely. I never water it, though since it is close to the seawall, its roots no doubt reach into the brackish water table. During a close pass of a hurricane years ago, salt/brackish water 1-3" deep covered the root area for several hours during high tide without doing any damage.


Our Jamaica caper was not damaged much by Hurricane Irma. Again, the root area was under water until the storm surge subsided. In fact, much of the back yard was covered during the surge, but no plants suffered any noticeable dmage from the inundation. (The surge line didn't reach the gardenia). I can't remember if or how badly the Jamaica caper was defoliated. There was just too much other stuff going on. There were very few broken branches. In any event, now you'd never guess it had been through a hurricane, while the eastern side of the bougainvilleas in the front yard is still not completely leafed out.


I haven't made a  satisfying watercolor of the Jamaica caper flowers in all the years we've lived here. My quick studies don't capture the glossiness of the leaves or the combination of grace and sturdiness that characterize this lovely plant. But I try.

Jamaica Caper

Next up : 7-year apple.