Florida is well known for having more than its share of flies, many of which bite or are obnoxious in some other way. But not all flies are unpleasant. In fact, I’m always quite happy when I run across a little bee fly (Villa spp). These guys are tiny, as you can see if you look at the size of the fly compared to the center of a blackjack flower. They’re too small to bite and are nonaggressive anyhow. They also don’t tend to fly into your face or ears or up your nose. In fact, in their own little fly way, they’re even kind of cute. They feed on flower nectar and are covered in thousands of tiny hairs making them very good pollinators for small flowers. This one was busy flying from flower to flower and having quite the feast. It was enjoyable watching it and trying to follow it to get some good photos. I had originally stopped to get some pictures of the phlox, but that particular patch of blackjack was just alive with a multitude of pollinators, and I couldn’t resist. I’ve always been a bit of a bug nerd, so given a patch of beautiful, colorful flowers or some less pretty flowers full of insects, I’ll go with the insects every time.