CLOSED: Andrena vaga; fam. Andrenidae ?

My bicycle trip during two days to the country side has been very fruitfully!
This one is one of the many bees that where feeding on Pentaglottis sempervirens (syn; Anchusa sempervirens) on uncultivated land near an old castle

It will be a female (they have the hairy pollen baskets on hind legs) but it doesn't look like Andrena vaga, on the BWARS site,

http://www.bwars.com/andrena_vaga.htm

There's so many Andrena species, and not all are represented well. I would hate to say what it is as so many look similar, I have quite a few lately and think I can ID some but an expert may think differently, lol,even they canhave problems with these.

http://www.bwars.com/Gallery.htm

A google shows silvery haired ones too, with an occasional exception but some may not be correct.

http://images.google.co.uk/images?hl=en&q=Andrena%20vaga&um=1&ie=UTF-8&sa=N&tab=wi

I should have done a deeper search before thinking it is Andrena vaga. I had based myself only on one picture in one of my insect-books that looked so similar I thougt it was the one.

Now I see it cannot be that one!

They are all very beautiful! I saw some that look very similar but will not come to conclusion, lol!
I'll just call it Andrena sp.

Thank you so much!

I got an Id for this one from a local Nature Forum by two persons
According to them it is most probable Andrena haemorrhoa


http://www.gardensafari.net/english/picpages/andrena_haemorrhoa.htm#.


http://hpbimg.peppix.de/HP_Andrena_haemorrhoa_1.jpg

I have just added pics of that to BugFiles! Look at mine, but it's difficult to tell unless you can see the tail end.

Yes, I have also been doubting because the colour of the legs of mine are more yellow and the thorax hairs don't look so reddish though I have many more pics of it where the thorax hairs look more reddish, so it must have been the light angle.
They also couldn't give an ID with just the only pict. I posted here, only after I send a couple more they came to that conclusion.
One of them said that in a colony he observed many graduations in colour, from quite pale to deep red.
Unfortunately I don't have one with the red tail-end enough visable.

I've seen yours when I wanted to enter mine and it made me doubt again about the ID of mine, lol!

A couple more pics;

A heavily cropped one of the first. I think I see some reddish from the tail end shining through the wing (or is it wishful thinking,lol)

another angle;

and another;

a last;

Now I am going to ask you if the first pic and the first of these last 4 pics are the same bee, lol, I know how they can get muddled after so long. I often take pics of two different bees on the same flowers, but they are more obvious.

Before I looked at the last three pics I placed one of mine alongside your first one of the last lot, and came to the conclusion that it was not A. haemorrhoa. Colour aside, the abdomen doesn't have the rounded shape, and I took 11 pics of mine, all have the wings well crossed over the back no matter what it was doing (except in flight which I got too!). This is often an indication.

Then I looked at your last 3 pics, and yes I would agree those 3 are A. haemorrhoa.

Here's a not so good one more face on to compare with your face on pic.

In this pic you can see how bare the abdomen is of hairs, your top ones have hairs near the top of the abdomen apart from the other points I noted.

You're right!!! :-{
I checked the properties of the pictures where it gives time and date and the first one was taken even on another date but in the same spot (I had gone back to the same place a week later). Later on I must have put them together (thinking they were the same specie) in the same map and forgot about it!
Now I remember that I went back there on purpose because I only had one picture of the first and wanted to have more for easier ID.

I compared the two faces and it looks like my bee is a bit worn out having lost hairs on the two spots aligning the inside of the eyes where yours still has reddish hairs there. Mine also has lost hairs on its thorax.

I'm going to put them now in separate maps! The first one having to stay Andrena sp.

Thanks! :)

Oh, I just found one more pict. of the face of the first that has escaped being thrown in the bin (same date, a few seconds later, lol), I had ignored because it is so blurry.
It's face is hairy all over not like A. haemorrhoa.

I have a feeling your other bee could be Andrena nigroaenea, I recognise the face, lol. When you look at them over and over like I have done evnetually some of the fog clears! That is only a 'maybe' though, if you could have seen the tail it would have been more certain as it has black hairs on the tail end.

http://www.bwars.com/andrena_nigroaenea.htm


Here's a face which I took when I disturbed it while cleaning up around some pots, it was hiding there. I feel fairly certain mine is A. nigroaenea, so will have to double check on that and make an entry for it here. This was on 11th April, a date is helpful too as you can often find when a bee is supposed to appear. It states on gardensafari from the beginning of April.

http://www.gardensafari.net/english/picpages/andrena_nigroaenea.htm

This was the following day on 12th April