The Bumble Bees are another recognizable group of flower lovers and pollen collectors. They are mostly social as are the honey bees with their division of labor into queens and drones and workers. The genus Bombus being the true bumble bees, there appear to be about 60 species in North America and about 25 in the eastern US. My working list for this genus in the east is here. Insect scientists have been fighting over the Bombus genus for years, arguing about genital spikes and horns, gaps and hairs. Ah me. But they are variable. And many can be separated by color and patterning of yellow and black. We'll just have to work on this.

For now, note 1) patterns of black on the thorax, 2) the yellow, orange and black banding arrangements on the abdominal segments and 3) color of the hair on the head segment. Don't know yet what species this is above.

Bumble from summertime. I think you can make out all the abdominal segment colors here and only the first appears yellow. This is the pattern for B. griseocollis but for now I am unsure.