You had a what?
A Volucella Zonaria! That is the latin name of the Hornet mimic hoverfly, but I prefer the Dutch name Stadsreus which translates as City Giant.
Because a big insect it is. This hoverfly can become upto 2,5 centimeter big. And that is quite big. The other bees look rather fragile compared to this 'giant'.
It also looks a lot like a hornet. But it is completely harmless since hoverflies don't have a stinger and don't bite.

I spotted this buddy from my house (which was quite easy since it was quite big). I took my phone outside to take a shot. I often use my phone so I can identify the species with my Obsidentify app. The app recognised it as a Volucella Zonaria with a 100% certainty.

Since it didn't mind my presence I went inside to get my camera and macro gear.
When I got back it had moved on to other flowers of my snowberry bush (which is a treat for flying insects at the moment). But since the hoverfly was so big I soon spotted it again.
Unfortunately it had moved to another branch and I could only photograph its backside.

You can clearly see it has no stinger and quite a flat abdomen.
You can also see the round and dark compound eyes.

It really makes the bees look small and fluffy...

The hoverfly also has much brighter colours. Where the bees are more brownish this hoverfly has black and yellow stripes.

The snowberry bush has a lot of tiny glowers. The bees have to clamp onto them to be able to stick their tongue into them to reach the nectar.
Luckily for me this is a bit difficult for them and that's why they hang onto the flower for a while, giving me the time to get some sharp shots.

And here is a final shot of the 'giant' in my backyard:

Thanks for visiting my blog!

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FriendlyMoose

Creating blogs about photography, cycling, gardening, craft beer and more...

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Every week I create a post with an overview of all the photography contests on Hive. You can find the weekly overview post by checking the #photocontests tag.
I also organise a weekly photography contest myself; the POB Photocontest. This weekly contests has a new subject every week and you can win POB tokens and Ecency points.
Check out the posts with the #pobphotocontest tag.

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