The African (double-banded) carpenter bee is a large Afrotropical bee in which females are black with two pale yellow or white bands across the thorax and front of the abdomen, while males are uniformly greenish-yellow. It occupies habitats from moist coastal fynbos to dry savanna across sub-Saharan Africa. Females are solitary nesters, excavating tunnels in dead wood or pithy stems and provisioning each cell with a pollen-and-nectar mass. The species is a generalist floral visitor and an important pollinator of legumes and many other garden flowers throughout its range.

Nectar plants · 4

Widespread across sub-Saharan Africa from Guinea and Cameroon south to South Africa, and east to Ethiopia and Kenya; also Madagascar, the Comoros, and the Seychelles. Occupies habitats from coastal fynbos to savanna.