The tormentil mining bee is a smallish species of mining bee but a distinguishing feature on the females is that the hind legs have orange tibia and tarsi and the thorax is partially covered above with black hairs and the propodeum being covered in dense pale grey hairs at each side.

[3] The tormentil mining bee has been described as a boreo-alpine species which in Europe has a northerly distribution and which becomes rarer in the south.

[1] In Great Britain it is widely distributed, although it is much rarer and more localised in Ireland and absent from the Channel Islands.

The bees collect pollen from the Potentilla flowers which they use to provision their nests as a food source for the larva.

[5] The adults fly from June to late August and have been recorded nectaring on bramble, harebell, ling, wild angelica and yarrow but tormentils are required for the provisioning the nest cells.