Yellow-legged Mining Bee - Andrena flavipes

The males look different to the females. They are slimmer, covered in sparser hair and lack the dense brush of orange-yellow hairs on the hind leg.

Nests in exposed banks and cliffs, tended lawns, flower beds, roadside verges and in sparsely vegetated field margins.

The bee has a two flight periods each year. It flies from March to May, and again from June to early August. The spring generation is usually much more numerous than the summer generation.

Andrena flavipes nests are constructed in the ground, and are often found in dense aggregations.

Mainly found in southern England. There are no records from Scotland or Ireland, and it is confined to the south coast in Wales. The species has become more widespread and plentiful since the late 1980’s.

Status in Leicestershire and Rutland not known.