Brazilian Jataí stingless bees

[Alex Wild]

Completely unplanned, on a recent Brazilian trip I stayed for a couple nights right next to a large stingless bee yard holding several species of native meliponines. Here are a couple shots of the little Tetragonisca angustula ("jataí") at their nest entrance:

Tetragonisca1-M.jpg

Tetragonisca2-M.jpg

They're pretty adorable little bees. Not harmless, though, in spite of their name. When angry they pull hair and generally make a nuisance of themselves.

Alex
www.alexanderwild.com

[OSafado]

I remember seeing and being fascinated with a "hive" of these outside the museum in Petropolis, Brasil. This was well before I started keeping bees myself.

Great pictures! Did you get any other information about these bees? Were they being "kept" or were they naturally there? Were they there for study, or were they commercial?

[gone2seed]

When angry they pull hair and generally make a nuisance of themselves.
Alex

I had a wife like that once.

[Alex Wild]

OSafado- the bees belonged to a farmer cooperative, and they had about 50 boxes with at least 3 different bee species, mostly Jataí.

gone2seed- yeah. But I bet there was also sweet, sweet honey.