I got a nice bonus while taking the photo of this lupine plant, a bumblebee came swooping in about two feet away, paying me no attention.

I wasn't prepared, and they were moving quickly, so my shutter speed was a bit too slow to freeze the motion, but I still love the result.

That little orange blob at the bottom? It's pollen! On the part of the leg called the pollen basket! I could see it clearly IRL, how cool is that?

#bumblebee #naturephotography #nature

@jeremyosborn oooh is that what the orange blob is?? bumbleebees and lupines are so made for each other, the flowers are basically bumbleebee-butt-shaped.

@pamelafox Yes, the "pollen basket" on the leg was loaded and super obvious to the human eye! I'm going to try to take a high speed photo later, the bees really don't seem to care about me standing there, lol.

@jeremyosborn i've seen that a bunch, but i kept thinking that it was just the variety of bumblebee that frequented our garden ("orange-leg bumblebee"). makes much more sense that its a pollen basket!

@pamelafox What I found really interesting was that the entry for the large-leaved lupine *specifically* mentions that bumblebees are their main visitors. Your butt-shape theory may be backed up by scientific evidence!
https://www.inaturalist.org/taxa/59549-Lupinus-polyphyllus

@pamelafox @jeremyosborn wow you two know each other?! what a small world!!!

@nsfmc @pamelafox Only recently via Masto, and solely from a mutual appreciation of bumblebee butts!