Bees: A Natural History
There are more species of bees than there are of birds and mammals combined. Although readers are familiar with the highly social honeybees and bumblebees, the majority of the world’s bees are solitary (or nonsocial). O’Toole (Bees of the World, 1992), an entomologist and bee expert, introduces readers to a sample of the world’s 20,000 bee species in this beautiful new book. Though honeybees and their long-term associations with humans are covered, the strength of the book is in its introduction of the rest of the kinds of bees. We learn of mason bees, euglossine bees, carpenter bees, and sweat bees. The lifestyle of the solitary bees, in which a female provides food for her developing offspring but does not directly care for them, is contrasted with the various stages of sociality in different species. The important role bees play in pollinating flowers—estimates are that one-third of human food depends on bee pollination—is illustrated both in the text and the accompanying photographs. The illustrations alone sell the book, with marvelous close-ups of a bee’s compound eyes and pollen-covered bees in flowers. The many appendixes and a large bibliography make this an informative introduction. --Nancy Bent