Australian stingless micro bee

It may be incredibly tiny, but this native bee together with its kin flying around my bottlebrush plants yesterday brought me a huge amount of joy.

These past few years I've been working hard in the gardens removing lawns, making fresh beds and any new plants brought in have been almost all Australian natives, specific to my area.

With loss of habitat, insecticides, disease and non-native competitors to contend with, our native bees need all the help they can get.

This was my first time trying to photograph these tiny, erratically flying characters - I certainly have deep respect for those people who have produced superb images I've seen during my research and reading!

4 mm length