Common carder bee

How to recognise it

A medium bumblebee entirely ginger-brown on the thorax with a paler, often greyish and variably black-flecked abdomen. Unlike almost every other British bumblebee it has no white or buff tail — the colour simply fades out.

• Ginger-brown thorax with no white tail — the absence of a tail band is the quickest character.
• Variable black flecking on the abdomen, more in the north and less in the south.
• Flies later into autumn than almost any other bumblebee, often into November.
• Nests on the surface in tussocky grass, moss and leaf litter rather than underground.

Body length 10–18 mm (typically 14 mm).

Biology

Social organisation

Eusocial, colony dies each autumn

A true colony with a queen and workers, but only for one season: everyone dies in autumn except mated new queens, who overwinter alone. Bumblebees.

Colony size at peak

60–200 individuals

Colony lifespan

One season, and a long one — colonies persist later into autumn than most.

Winter

Mated new queens overwinter alone; the rest of the colony dies.

Castes

Queen, Workers, Males, New queens

Nesting

Burrows in the ground; Existing cavities and tubes

Nests on the surface rather than below it, in tussocky grass, moss, leaf litter, old bird nests and compost heaps. The workers comb surrounding material over the nest to conceal and insulate it — carding, in the same sense as carding wool, and the behaviour the common name records.

Carries pollen

Corbicula (pollen basket) on the hind leg

On the wing

March to November

One of the longest bumblebee seasons in northern Europe.

Lifecycle

1. 1Queen emergenceQueens emerge in spring, later than the buff-tailed bumblebee, and found nests at ground level.March to May.
2. 2A long colony seasonColonies build slowly and persist far into autumn, which is why carder bees are often the last bumblebees seen in a garden.
3. 3ReproductionMales and new queens are produced from late summer into October.

Where it lives and what it does

Habitat

Gardens, hedgerows, grassland, woodland edge, brownfield and coastal land — one of the most catholic bumblebees in its habitat use.

Distribution

Across Europe and into western Asia, and one of the most widespread and abundant bumblebees on the continent.

Behaviour

Steady, unhurried and persistent. Its moderately long tongue lets it use deeper flowers than the buff-tail can, and its very long season means it is working plants — ivy, aster, dead-nettle — that most bumblebees have stopped visiting by the time they flower.

Pollination role

A generalist of real importance because of its season length and its intermediate tongue. It bridges the gap between the short-tongued generalists and the long-tongued specialists, and it is working through the autumn when most alternatives have gone.

High, and particularly valuable in early spring and late autumn when few other bumblebees are flying.

What it forages on

A broad generalist with a preference for the mint and pea families.

Honey

Keeps only a few days of stores

A few days' worth of stores in wax pots, as with all bumblebees.

Relationship with people

How people interact with it

Common in gardens and frequently disturbed by mowing, since its nests sit at the surface in exactly the long grass people cut in July. It is one of the strongest arguments for leaving an area of tussocky grass uncut.

Conservation

One of the bumblebees that has held its ground, and a useful counterpoint to the general decline narrative — the species doing badly are mostly the long-tongued specialists of unimproved grassland, not the adaptable generalists.