Sweat Bees
Halictidae

The sweat bee family is made up of nearly 4,500 sub-species that get their name from their attraction to human perspiration. They are native pollinators and can be found worldwide.

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Green sweat bee feeds upon a bright yellow tickseed coreopsis.
A pure green sweat bee visits tickseed coreopsis planted along a restored stretch of Cabin Creek at Mathis Park in Hopewell, Va., on May 27, 2022. (Photo by Will Parson/Chesapeake Bay Program)

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Appearance

While the subspecies of sweat bees are diverse in their appearance, most are slender, small to medium-sized bees. Most are brown or black in color, but some have metallic green, blue or purple coloring. Sweat bees also have stripes similar to that of a honey bee.

Feeding

Like many other bees, sweat bees feed on nectar and pollen, pollinating flowers in the process. They also supplement their diet with salts, often obtaining it from the sweat of humans.

Predators

Sweat bees are prey to various species of birds, spiders and flying insects.

Reproduction and Life Cycle

Most sweat bees reproduce through internal fertilization, often nesting underground. Sweat bees go through four stages of metamorphosis (egg, larva, pupa, adult) before they are fully grown, which can take anywhere from 17 to 40 days.

Did You Know?

  • Many species of sweat bees can “buzz-pollinate,” which means they can produce a vibration with the flight muscles in their thorax that can be used to trigger the release of the pollen of certain flowers.

  • Sweat bee species exhibit the full range of bee social behaviors, including solitary, communal, semi-social and primitively eusocial habits. Sometimes different populations of the same species exhibit different social behaviors depending on time of year, altitude or geographic location.

  • A universal characteristic among sweat bees is their short tongue length compared with those of other types of bees.

Sources and Additional Information

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