The Very Handy Manual: How to Catch and Identify Bees and Manage a Collection

A Collective and Ongoing Effort by Those Who Love to Study Bees in North America

Last Revised: September 2015

This manual is a compilation of the wisdom and experience of many individuals, some of whom are directly acknowledged here and others not. We thank all of you. The bulk of the text was compiled by Sam Droege at the USGS Bee Inventory and Monitoring Lab (BIML), Patuxent Wildlife Research Center, Beltsville, Maryland, over several years from 2004-2008. We regularly update the manual with new information, so, if you have a new technique, some additional ideas for sections, corrections or additions, we would like to hear from you. Please email those to Sam Droege (sdroege@usgs.gov). You can also email Sam if you are interested in joining the “Bee Inventory, Monitoring, and ID” discussion group. Many thanks to Dave and Janice Green, Gene Scarpulla, Liz Sellers, and Tracy Zarrillo for their many hours of editing this manual.

"They've got this steamroller going, and they won't stop until there's nobody fishing. What are they going to do then, save some bees?" – Mike Russo (Massachusetts fisherman who has fished cod for 18 years, discussing environmentalists) – Provided by Matthew Shepherd