{"id":786628,"date":"2026-02-24T21:16:17","date_gmt":"2026-02-24T21:16:17","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/786628\/"},"modified":"2026-02-24T21:16:17","modified_gmt":"2026-02-24T21:16:17","slug":"its-round-and-furry-has-a-huge-tube-like-mouth-sticking-out-of-its-face-and-it-sucks-the-life-out-of-bee-grubs","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/786628\/","title":{"rendered":"It&#8217;s round and furry, has a huge tube-like mouth sticking out of its face \u2013 and it sucks the life out of bee grubs"},"content":{"rendered":"<p><strong>If you\u00a0spend time near a sunny verge covered in primroses, you may well notice a fascinating insect called the bee-fly. There are actually a few species, with the dark-edged, or greater, bee-fly being most common in the UK.<\/strong><\/p>\n<p>Perhaps the first thing you\u2019ll notice is the enormous proboscis that sticks way out in front of its face. Then you may be struck by how much its rotund, furry body looks like a bee. And, in fact, its wings buzz loudly like a bee too.<\/p>\n<p>This is no coincidence because the <a href=\"https:\/\/www.discoverwildlife.com\/animal-facts\/insects-invertebrates\/bee-flies\" rel=\"nofollow noopener\" target=\"_blank\">bee-fly<\/a> is an expert bee mimic. Its disguise enables it to approach the nest tunnels of various digging and mining bees, such as ashy mining bees, so it can flick its eggs inside.<\/p>\n<p>When the bee-fly&#8217;s <a href=\"https:\/\/www.discoverwildlife.com\/animal-facts\/parasites-guide\" rel=\"nofollow noopener\" target=\"_blank\">parasitic<\/a> maggots hatch, they will suck the life out of the hapless bee grubs. Gruesome stuff. In the meantime, the adult bee-flies are entertaining to watch as they dart between primroses, lungwort and other spring-flowering plants with tube-shaped blooms.<\/p>\n<p>Their impressive proboscis is adapted to reach the nectar at the bottom.<\/p>\n<p><video controls=\"\" poster=\"https:\/\/c02.purpledshub.com\/uploads\/sites\/62\/2026\/02\/Bombylius-major.jpg\" preload=\"none\" src=\"https:\/\/c02.purpledshub.com\/uploads\/sites\/62\/2026\/02\/Bombylius-major.mp4\"\/>Unlike bees, bee-flies \u2013 such as this dark-edged bee-fly (Bombylius major) \u2013 don\u2019t sting and have one pair of wings. Credit: Dan Badiu\/Getty Images<\/p>\n<p>Top image: dark-edged bee-fly (bombylius major). Credit: Nigel Harris\/Getty Images<\/p>\n<p><strong>More about insects<\/strong><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"If you\u00a0spend time near a sunny verge covered in primroses, you may well notice a fascinating insect called&hellip;\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":786629,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":"","_share_on_mastodon":"0"},"categories":[3847],"tags":[70,16,15,1717],"class_list":["post-786628","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-wildlife","tag-science","tag-uk","tag-united-kingdom","tag-wildlife"],"share_on_mastodon":{"url":"https:\/\/pubeurope.com\/@uk\/116127687187001233","error":""},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/786628","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=786628"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/786628\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/786629"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=786628"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=786628"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=786628"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}