Life in my garden today

There's lots of sizes and shapes to hover flies. Some look like bees, some look more like wasps...But it looks like it has one pair of wings, big eyes, and those little short antennae...

Hi KKB,

Saw your post and asked hubby about the above fly in question. He says it is a bee fly, of the Bombyliidae family in the Diptera order--the true flies with one pair of wings. He does have a PhD in this stuff, so I trust him pretty much with IDs.

Here is a pic I took of a bee fly on some cosmos that is related to yours. Hubby says mine is puking whereas yours is feeding, LOL. Our flies don't look too similar but they ARE in the same family, like spearmint and perilla are in the same family but don't look much alike, or even smell alike for that matter. ;-)

Cool pic! Gross too! I expected worse looking puke tho! LOL That fellow is clear looking. I don't think I've ever seen one like that.

So...mine is actually a fly? I had no idea! Wow...so they mimic bees, which means they don't really sting? How interesting. Now I'm going to have to look thru all my pics and see if I have more of these that I thought were bees.

They are very much like Hover Flies tho. Here is some info I Googled:

"Both flies in Bee Flies family and Hover flies (Syrphidae) family mimic bees. The main character to recognize between them is Bee Flies have longer wings. Hover Flies have shorter wings with a series of closed cell on the wings hind margins. "

Thanks to you Hill and your DH! Now would you mind asking him if Hover Flies are actually very small? (isn't he glad you joined DG?)

Paige

LOL, glad you liked the pic. I had no idea he was busy regurgitating when I was taking his picture. Personally, I am glad that his puke DIDN'T look any grosser. I actually thought he was taking in a big old drink when I saw him, but when I showed the pic to DH he responded immediately with an exclamation of how neat that I had a pic of a fly throwing up! Oooookay.

So, yes, yours is a fly that mimics bees, and as far as what DH has told me, they don't sting. I agree they are very similar to Hover flies, which I think are pretty cool. When I was a kid, we used to catch the Hover flies and hold them in our cupped hands up to our ears to hear them buzz. We called them tickle bees because we didn't know any better. I'll ask DH about Hover fly sizes and get back to you.

And as far as joining DG, hubby was the one who subscribed and I have become by default the one who posts. We didn't plan it that way, it just turned out that way. We will have to work something out I guess if he ever wants to post.

Nice to meet you Paige--I'm Kenya.

Konkrete,

What inspiring gardens! I just started getting interested in perennials last year and only dream of gardens like yours. What do they look like in the winter? Do you plant any evergreens in there for winter interest or just let it all die back?

Debra

Paige, when you cast all that seed around, are you casting it on top of mulch? Amended soil? Or just plain soil? We have to mulch pretty heavily down here, and I always wondered if seed could get started on top of mulch. Also, many types of wildflowers prefer poor soil, so.... what's a gardener to do? Tell us your secrets!!!
:-)

Thanks for the info on the cosmos. I think I'll opt to leave my seedlings as they are, kind of close together.

I was just looking at your photos and this time around, I noticed some orange cosmos interwoven into your flower borders. I am reminded to start growing orange cosmos as soon as tomorrow.

I just read what you were saying about the ants and the cosmos. You can actually kill the ants without harming the plants by pouring a mixture of orange oil and water on them. Medina is one of the brands I've seen, sold at Lowes (it's not always easy to find, but they have a growing section of organic things in their garden section.) The orange oils kills the ants... and their eggs, and it will kill any worms it comes in contact with, but it doens't poicon the soil, microbes, etc, and the worms can re-populate.

Thanks again everyone! Thanks Kenya for all the info. We're glad that you ended up posting. I'm sure we'll like your DH too.

I think someone asked me about the Bee Balm and said they wanted seeds, but I have never seen seeds on them. ? The spread by runners so they transplant really easy. I have been cutting some of it back, just down to where new leaves are on both sides of the stem, to see if it will bloom more. If not I'll end up cutting it down because it annoys me after it's bloomed.

Thank you Debra! I'm amazed that I'm an inspiration. I don't have any evergreens planted but we don't really have "winter" here so sometimes I still have green. It usually is just dead brown when it gets cooler and after a freeze. I have so much maintenance to do and so much to cut down and clean up in the fall that I don't worry about any winter color. I'm not organized enough to plan that. I don't do well with plans which is why the throwing seeds works for me.

Mary, the mulching gives me problems sometimes too. I put out mulch and compost all year long. I threw the seeds out just like the plants would, right on top of the ground. I figure whatever nature normally does is easiest. Not everything germinated because I threw out a lot. Some things didn't germinate at all so they must do better throwing them out in the Spring. (Cleomes, Gomphrenas)

In the spring I hesitate to mulch heavily because I'm waiting for seeds. This year I bought a new compost from Lowe's (Texas Native Compost) and it was so soft and fine so I put it everywhere. I've not had any problems with any of my zinnias or milkweeds coming up thru it or old compost. I just threw out a bunch of Gloriosa Daisies, gomphrena, milkweed, cornflower, and other things the other day. I hope some of that germinates because some areas are looking scraggly and bare. (that means I can see dirt)

Those orange cosmos are EVERYWHERE in my front bed. They are so thick that they are like a forest. I have pulled some of them out and given some away and they just reseed daily. I have been collecting seed and trying to actually deadhead some of them. (that might be a losing battle) I'm finding that my crowded front bed is actually sheltering the soil from the afternoon heat and I'm not having to water as much and haven't lost anything. Occassionally I see signs of spider mites but not bad.

The big cosmos are the ones that get the ants, not the little orange ones. I just used the last of my Medina Orange oil. I also use GardenVille's Anti-Fuego. It didn't get rid of these ants tho! The problem with the orange oil is that it can't get deep enough so it just kills those on top, and then the reinforcements come.

Y'all have inspired me to go out and see what's out there today. I have eggs on my milkweed! I had 2 small Monarch cats that disappeared overnight so I'm going to be bringing them in. (Mary, I can't stop myself!!)

Hi Paige--apparently the beebalm is a prolific seed producer. I started my crop this year from seed, a packet I picked up at Wmart for 97 cents. I only used about a quarter of the packet, if that, when I sowed them. I have the rest of the packet of seeds left, somewhere in the greenhouse. Which reminds me, weren't you the one who was interested in some of my bicolor gaillardia seeds? The gaillardia blooms look like a double fanfare. I have some seed left in the original packet, plus I will be collecting seed from my gaillardia this year too. I am afraid that I never found anymore at Wmart. I would imagine that by the end of this season or at a plant swap or roundup, we'll have plenty of seeds or plants to share and swap with. Hubby and I are discussing attending the Dallas swap and the Texas RU.

Ok, you had asked me about Hover fly sizes. When I posed this question to hubby he said that Hover flies have a pretty good size range from teeny-tiny to upwards of 3 inches. I can't recall seeing a 3 inch Hover fly (that's pretty BIG), so I'll have to get him to give me some specific examples of Hover flies that large. Of course, he could have told me upwards of 1 inch and my memory has blown it out of proportion to 3 inches. I'll double check. Didn't want you to think I had forgotten your question.

Here's a pic of my beebalm blooming away today. Can you spot the dayflying sphinx moth? I was trying to get his/her picture, but according to this link, even a 1/3000 of a second speed barely freezes the wing motion!

http://www.odolep.com/Moths/SPHINGIDAE/amphion_floridensis.htm

Here's a cropped close-up of the little bugger.

Clarification on the Hover fly sizes--hubby says he has never seen a Hover fly larger than a honey bee. Know where I got the 3 inch length? When DH described the size, he held his fingers open about 3 inches, calling that "about an inch wingspan". Well, everything IS bigger in Texas, LOL!! :-p So this time I had to ask him for an insect comparison--the honey bee--one that I knew the size of!

I hope this covers what you wanted to know about the Hover fly sizes. Thanks for the questions, this is how I learn, too. Now if I can just remember stuff correctly...