Wasps?

This ivy seemed alive with wasps again around noon earlier today, warm with the sun out. But they don't seem to have survived the Samsung treatment, and I can only find five or six when I zoom in. Perhaps it is the lack of movement which makes them hard to pick out.

I say wasps, but BH, who was not there on this occasion, seems to think bees are more likely. I asked Bard but he was not particularly helpful although I did learn that:

'Bees are pollinators, and they rely on flowers for food. Ivy blooms in the late fall, when many other flowers have died back. Bees are attracted to ivy's nectar and pollen, and they play an important role in pollinating this plant.

Wasps are predators and scavengers. They eat other insects, spiders, and nectar. Wasps are attracted to ivy's nectar, but they are not as dependent on it as bees. Wasps are also more likely to be active in the heat of the day, while bees are more active in the morning and evening'.

Checking, I find a distinction between what wasps eat and what they feed their larvae, who can, it seems, deal with a wider variety of solid food than the adult. Something which Bard did not think to mention, although he did think that I was interested in wasp stings.

And then his logic seemed to fail on my follow-up.

All that said, my rather dim memory of getting for twelve hours ago, does not include the bright yellow and black striped abdomens with pointed ends that I associate with wasps. So my money is on bees - but not the bumble sort.

PS: mid-afternoon on Friday, that is to say the following day, we came across some more busy ivy, not far from junction 17 on the M4. And BH was quite clear on this occasion that it was bees.

References

Reference 1: https://psmv5.blogspot.com/2023/09/skinner.html. Previous notice.