These insects form a natural group, united by having a wasp waist and a sting. In fact only the females sting, as this is formed from the modified egg-laying apparatus.

There are approximately 600 British species in the group, including some 250 bees, 50 ants and about 300 species of wasps. Of these, about 460 species have so far been found in Kent.

The layperson usually associates these insects with the large nests of the social forms but in fact most bees and wasps are solitary creatures, the females making nests individually and provisioning them independently of others of their kind.

The solitary waps are a diverse assemblage, many being small, black insects which superficially resemble flying ants. Indeed some solitary bees can be rather similar, and the two can be confused. Other solitary bees may resemble the honeybee and a few look like small bumblebees.

In the last few years the large carpenter bee has turned up in our country. It resembles a large, black bumblebee with a violet sheen to the dark wings and is a migrant from the Continent.

Ants are insects which have fascinated people throughout history with their intricate social behaviour, all species indeed being social. The workers are always wingless but in most kinds the males and queens are winged. The queens shed their wings after the marriage flight and usually start colonies independently.

In the wood ants, however, the new queens are usually accepted back into the large mounds nests, which reproduce by budding off new colonies. In this case, some of the queens (there may be many in a nest) and workers migrate to a new spot, constructing a new mound which grows over several years.

The social wasps are a group feared and respected by most people but only two of the nine or ten British species are particularly aggressive. All species will vindictively defend their nest, however.

The social bees in Britain are represented by the honeybee (not native) and the bumblebees, of which there are about 25 different kinds in our country.

There are six common species of bumbles in Kent but identification of the workers is not always straight forward. A number of species are in decline, not only in Britain but also on the Continent; intensive farming may be in part responsible.

The known distributions of the Kent bees, wasps and ants are rather patchy (see map: click to zoom out); for some areas of the county there is very little information.