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A Garden for Bees and Butterflies
All herb gardens make wonderful feeding grounds for bees
and butterflies as herbs are usually highly scented, rich
in nectar and closer to their wild forms than many scentless and hybridized garden plants.
To make an especially attractive herb garden for bees and
butterflies, choose the sunniest and most protected corner
of the garden. Plant a sheltering hedge of the largest old
English lavender or rosemary and train honeysuckle (early
and late flowering varieties) up an enclosing fence or trellis.
Bees will forage for up to half a mile from their hive but
various herbs have traditionally been grown around the hive itself.
Virgil suggested savory, while whole plants of sweet cicely
and lemon balm used to be rubbed over the hives to attract bees.
However bees are more attracted by colour and especially by
blues, purples, and yellows. Bees with short tongues will
feed from rue, achillea and chamomile flowers but hive bees
with their longer tongues gather nectar from long-tubed
flowers such as those of the labiate family which bloom from early summer.
First there is a thyme blossom, them marjoram and sage;
lavender and catmint are blooming by midsummer with hyssop and finally winter savory in the early autumn.
The annual borage is rich in nectar, so are other members
of the family such as viper’s bugloss and the anchusas and
alkanet. Melilot, another annual, produces quantities of
nectar and derives its name from honey (Latin, mel)
Butterflies are more attracted by scent and prefer rather
faded colours. They are more likely to visit the pale
mauve flowers of old English lavender than the darker "Hidcote" varieties and the pink dianthus rather than the
more richly coloured clove carnation.
It is worth making sure that there are early and late
flowering herbs in the garden to provide continuous nectar
throughout the season. In autumn the pink or white flowered (not the double) forms of meadow saffrons are
valuable. Provide the bee garden with hellebores in the
early spring, then primroses and cowslips and in late spring the herbaceous monkshood.
Among the best spring bee herbs is the wallflower, which
used to be called ‘bee flower’. In the early 17th century
Gervase Markham wrote ‘The Husbandman preserves it most in his Bee-garden, for it wondrous sweet and
affordeth much honey’. The small, wild, yellow flowered
wallflower blooms for several months.
Published Francis Lincoln Ltd, UK, 1984. ISBN:
0 7112 0388
I think that no matter how old or infirm I may become, I will always plant a large garden in the spring. Who can resist the feelings of hope and joy that one gets from participating in nature's rebirth?
- Edward Giobbi
Check roses for fungal diseases that cause leaf yellowing. Prevent diseases by annually replacing mulch, pruning roses properly, and spraying an organic control such as neem oil.
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