bumblebees & couchsurfers

Today I went to the university library of Auckland to find some information on New-Zealand bumblebees. It was very fun and I got to see all these old journals (mostly New Zealand journal of science and technology). I copied some articles and read them in the park, while watching the bumblebees flie by in their constant journey for food. It appears there are 3 species which have been succesfully introduced: Bombus terrestris, B. ruderatus and B. subterraneus, all of which have the typical black/yellow/white colour patern, although it differs slightly between them. The most comon species is the B. terrestris or earth bumblebee (grote aardhommel), and it has a very remarcable story to tell. This species will hibernate for about 3 months in Belgium and England during the winter and has its whole colony cycle fine tuned to that. Here in New Zealand however, conditions or different and there is no need for the queen to go into hibernation. Probably temperatures are more favourable and more food is available during the winter years. This doesn't mean that fertilised queens can go on immediately to start a nest, they have to wait one or two months for warmer conditions, but they don't wait underground. The better weather also brings confusion to the queens, as the few hot days in the winter will often fool them into starting a nest prematurly, thus failin almost certainly. The other two species do hibernate, ruderatus for about two months and subterraneus for about 5 months. It's very interesting to see that these creatures/organisms (hihi) can survive in conditions to which they are not at all adapted to. This literature was all very old (1954-) and I think I had heard about 4 different species existing in New-Zealand, so it might be possible that another kind has been established. I'm thinking of having another go on rearing my own bumblebees in an artificial nest and will look into some local literature about the subject soon.
Later today I met up with couchsurfers Danitsja and Daniel, and we went to the Belgian Beer Cafe downtown (not the one where I will be working). We had a nice conversation about traveling and all the adventures that come with it, and about New-Zealand. We may go to the Ringitoto island tomorow and climb the vulcano together and I also invited them to come along to the ultimate frisbee tournament in Takapuna on sunday.
It has been a good day :-)