Although native bees generally seem to have been sparse here this season, suddenly the bee condominium has become a hive of activity to coin a phrase. Resin bees have been working busily provisioning and sealing their brood chambers. The seal is made from resin and chewed leaf, both obtained from the Eucalyptus leucoxylon not far away. The source of the pollen is unknown but flowering grevilleas, correas, eremophila and vanilla lilies are possibles. The first images show one bee making the final seal.

Here is the seal completed.

A short distance away in the condo another bee is also working, the first picture shows it with its abdominal hairs loaded with pollen.

Later pictures showed it going in without pollen, perhaps with resin.

In the garden the Eucalyptus parramattensis has been in flower, with the snowy white blossom drawing in a range of insects. One was a new bee record bringing the garden total up to fifteen species recorded. It is Leioproctus amabilis, the Lovable Leioproctus, a female collecting the white pollen. A smaller unidentified species was also working.

Unidentified due to lack of detail.

A trip to the Marlay Point area to check the flowering Bursarias for insect life was rewarded with another bee species photographed for the first time. It is the Bright-tailed Resin Bee, Megachile lucidiventris.

Another first record was made at the wood heap, when a tiny Pseudoscorpion, Family Chernetidae, came out from a crevice. These prey on other small invertebrates, immobilising them with venom from their nipper glands.