92 BEES OF GREAT BRITAIN. 



51. Andrena labialis. 



A. nigra, pallide villosa ; thorace fulvescenti ; pedibus fulvo- 

 villosis; abdominis seginentis intermediis utrinque striga alba. 

 Mas, facie albida. 



Melitta labialis, Kirby, Mon. Ap. Angl ii. 148. 87 # . 

 Andrena labialis, Smith, Zool. v. 1921. <J $ . 



Nyland. Revis. Ap. Boreal, p. 256. 23. 

 Andrena separata, Smith, Zool. v. 1922. 55 (var. $ ?). 



Female. Length 5J-6 lines. Black ; the face has a pale ful- 

 vous pubescence, the clypeus naked and strongly punctured. 

 Thorax strongly punctured, thinly clothed with short fulvous 

 pubescence, at the sides and on the metathorax it is more 

 dense and of a paler colour ; the tegulae pale testaceous ; the 

 wings fulvo-hyaline, their nervures ferruginous, faintly clouded 

 at their apical margins ; the legs have a short fulvous pubes- 

 cence ; the apical joints of the tarsi ferruginous ; the scopa 

 fulvous, the floccus pale fulvous. Abdomen ovate, shining, 

 finely and closely punctured ; the three intermediate segments 

 have a narrow fringe of pale fulvous pubescence, the first two 

 usually interrupted, the apical fimbria fulvous. B.M. 



Male. Length 5-6 lines. Black ; the clypeus and the face on 

 each side pale yellow, the former having a minute angular dot 

 on each side ; the face has a pale fulvous pubescence, on the disk 

 of the thorax it is fulvous, paler on the sides and on the legs ; 

 wings as in the female. Abdomen ovate-lanceolate, punctured 

 as in the other sex, and having a pale fulvous fringe on the 

 apical margins of the segments, frequently obliterated on the 

 first, and usually interrupted on the two following ; the extreme 

 apex fulvous. B.M. 



This bee usually appears about the end of May ; it is not un- 

 common to the north of London, about Hampstead and High- 

 gate, but I believe it to be local : I have not yet seen it from 

 the north of England. The bright colouring which this species 

 exhibits when first disclosed soon fades, and this cannot be too 

 much impressed on the mind in studying these descriptions. 



It is very probable that A. separata is only a variety of the 

 female, notwithstanding its having a white clypeus ; it occurs in 

 company with the other, but very rarely. 



