The intelligence that Nature provides its sons is a thing of wonder. It amazes one that they found the perfect hexagons they build their honeycombs in is the strongest structure long before humans found the mathematical fact with a mathematical proof. Even today, by mathematical laws of aerodynamics, the bumble bee with his massive body and wispy wings should not be able to get airborne or fly. But he flies beautifully anyway. They are more intelligent than us; we are just arrogant.
Are you wanting to have the meadows etc in order to help bees out? Because I think that by adding honeybees, you would be being counterproductive. Honeybees aren't really at risk of extinction etc like wild bees are, and introducing them to your garden means introducing more competition for food for the wild bees, so in way potentially making things more difficult for them (unless I guess you have millions of flowers and there's enough for everyone).
Oh, yes. Please only help the stressed wild species indigenous to the area. It will just hurt them to introduce an outside colony.
@gr.letley I haven't done either of the things you're thinking of (keeping bees or making a largeish wildflower meadow) but I do garden in the driest part of the country (mid Suffolk / Essex border). From observations of others and my own experience I would say:
The flowers I would include in a meadow style of planting to attract bees / other pollinators and which seem to cope reasonably well with drought would include: verbena bonariensis, ox-eye daisies (top plant!), meadow cranesbill (and other hardy geraniums), salvia caradonna, cowslips, clover, achillea, and various umbellifers such as dill.
The cheapest way to 'grow a meadow' is with a seed mix and there are some very good companies about who will make up customised mixes according to soil and aspect. If your front garden is N facing I wonder if you need a mix of plants more suited to shady areas?
Probably the most expensive (but quickest and most convenient) way to plant a meadow is with wild flower turf (ie rolls of turf with wildflowers already seeded or planted).
Personally I'd opt for the seed but also buy in a load of wild flower plug plants to get things up and running a bit quicker - especially if the seed mix didn't contain all the plants you wanted.
I would also forget about the bee hives for now and concentrate on the meadow(s). You can use the time to do a bit more research whether or not your garden would be a suitable place to keep a bee hive. It sounds a bit small to me and wild bees will set up their colonies around the garden if they like the environment.
A final point to make is that this is your front garden - and you should remember that wildflower meadows can look quite scruffy for some of the year. One of our neighbours decided to 're-wild' (slightly different to planting a wildflower meadow I know) his front garden last year and (to be honest) most of the time it's just looks like a weedy mess.
Be prepared to spend time cultivating plants of merit and pulling out thugs. I would also suggest keeping a neatly mown path around and through the meadow to make it look tidier and tended. Just my personal preference - but worth thinking about. A couple of focal point small trees or shrubs might also help to give it year-round structure.
Enjoy playing!🙂
Heaven is ... sitting in the garden with a G&T and a cat while watching the sun go down
Bees did not land on any of my Verbenas even when there were slim pickings, but butterflies did, TopB???
Regular big Buttercups. They flower in early spring and are a lifesaver for that just-out-of-hybernation hungry bumbles and honey bees who love to roll in it.
Forget-me-Nots for very early flowers, also a lifesaver for hungry bees.
Poppies, various varieties. California Poppies are lovely.
Dianthus various colours Some Nettles in a corner for butterflies to lay eggs.
Polemonium caeruleum
Phacelia attracts bees, butterflies, and ladybirds. (not my picture)
It's so nice to hear other people have a love of 🐝 and providing places for them. I have always loved gardening and providing for wildlife, we walk among the bumblebees and I've even saved a good few from drowning in our ponds. They don't mind me at all and it's wonderful to stand so close and watch them going about their business. I've never been stung by a 🐝, but I have by wasps and react very badly to their stings, don't know how I would react to a honey 🐝 sting. Our garden really belongs to the birds, bees, butterflies and hedgehogs, those that stay and the visitors. We made our own Hedgehog and 🐝 boxes and this is the third year we have had colonies, but only the second year in the boxes, I was told they never use the same box twice. The only problem we have had is the wax moth that gets in and will destroy a nest, which is why we make two or three boxes each year. We have provided every type of flower the bees love, their favourites scabious, cornflower Russian Sage and lavender, which is still in flower, loads of forget-me-nots, honeysuckle etc, it's a bee menu in both the front and back garden and we even had people coming to take photos of the front garden and all the bees and butterflies. Our wildlife pond has newts and frogs, the birds have a water cascade, pond and bird baths. The old words, you provide it and they will come is true. I've been in touch with our local bee keeping community and just waiting for a reply. I've added a lot of extra flowers to the meadow mix, but now we have dug over, I think there will be plenty of extra bee food next year from the plants that have self seeded.
@gr.letley I haven't done either of the things you're thinking of (keeping bees or making a largeish wildflower meadow) but I do garden in the driest part of the country (mid Suffolk / Essex border). From observations of others and my own experience I would say:
The flowers I would include in a meadow style of planting to attract bees / other pollinators and which seem to cope reasonably well with drought would include: verbena bonariensis, ox-eye daisies (top plant!), meadow cranesbill (and other hardy geraniums), salvia caradonna, cowslips, clover, achillea, and various umbellifers such as dill.
The cheapest way to 'grow a meadow' is with a seed mix and there are some very good companies about who will make up customised mixes according to soil and aspect. If your front garden is N facing I wonder if you need a mix of plants more suited to shady areas?
Probably the most expensive (but quickest and most convenient) way to plant a meadow is with wild flower turf (ie rolls of turf with wildflowers already seeded or planted).
Personally I'd opt for the seed but also buy in a load of wild flower plug plants to get things up and running a bit quicker - especially if the seed mix didn't contain all the plants you wanted.
I would also forget about the bee hives for now and concentrate on the meadow(s). You can use the time to do a bit more research whether or not your garden would be a suitable place to keep a bee hive. It sounds a bit small to me and wild bees will set up their colonies around the garden if they like the environment.
A final point to make is that this is your front garden - and you should remember that wildflower meadows can look quite scruffy for some of the year. One of our neighbours decided to 're-wild' (slightly different to planting a wildflower meadow I know) his front garden last year and (to be honest) most of the time it's just looks like a weedy mess.
Be prepared to spend time cultivating plants of merit and pulling out thugs. I would also suggest keeping a neatly mown path around and through the meadow to make it look tidier and tended. Just my personal preference - but worth thinking about. A couple of focal point small trees or shrubs might also help to give it year-round structure.
@gr.letley I haven't done either of the things you're thinking of (keeping bees or making a largeish wildflower meadow) but I do garden in the driest part of the country (mid Suffolk / Essex border). From observations of others and my own experience I would say:
The flowers I would include in a meadow style of planting to attract bees / other pollinators and which seem to cope reasonably well with drought would include: verbena bonariensis, ox-eye daisies (top plant!), meadow cranesbill (and other hardy geraniums), salvia caradonna, cowslips, clover, achillea, and various umbellifers such as dill.
The cheapest way to 'grow a meadow' is with a seed mix and there are some very good companies about who will make up customised mixes according to soil and aspect. If your front garden is N facing I wonder if you need a mix of plants more suited to shady areas?
Probably the most expensive (but quickest and most convenient) way to plant a meadow is with wild flower turf (ie rolls of turf with wildflowers already seeded or planted).
Personally I'd opt for the seed but also buy in a load of wild flower plug plants to get things up and running a bit quicker - especially if the seed mix didn't contain all the plants you wanted.
I would also forget about the bee hives for now and concentrate on the meadow(s). You can use the time to do a bit more research whether or not your garden would be a suitable place to keep a bee hive. It sounds a bit small to me and wild bees will set up their colonies around the garden if they like the environment.
A final point to make is that this is your front garden - and you should remember that wildflower meadows can look quite scruffy for some of the year. One of our neighbours decided to 're-wild' (slightly different to planting a wildflower meadow I know) his front garden last year and (to be honest) most of the time it's just looks like a weedy mess.
Be prepared to spend time cultivating plants of merit and pulling out thugs. I would also suggest keeping a neatly mown path around and through the meadow to make it look tidier and tended. Just my personal preference - but worth thinking about. A couple of focal point small trees or shrubs might also help to give it year-round structure.
Enjoy playing!🙂
What do you mean by 're-wild'? I've got the seed, but I've also added a few extra that I know the bees love that was not in the mix, we've got shrubs already and two small buddleia, but the butterflies prefer those. We did have some lovely Lupins, sadly the slugs destroyed them this year, so I've lifted them. Now we are just waiting to finish raking so I can sow the seeds this week.
How did you attract your bee colonies, GR? We have temporary scaffolding up for roof repairs and I have seen Bumbles crawling into one of the pipes, no doubt thinking it was a permanent structure that is good for making a home. So, I bought a couple of those Bumble Bee wooden box houses the National Trust sells and put them around the garden with moss and a Vita swarm sachet in each, hoping to attract them. And a NT bird box I had around, too.
The poor beauties are going to lose their honey home when they take down the scaffolding. I have warned the workmen to be careful.
How did you attract your bee colonies, GR? We have temporary scaffolding up for roof repairs and I have seen Bumbles crawling into one of the pipes, no doubt thinking it was a permanent structure that is good for making a home. So, I bought a couple of those Bumble Bee wooden box houses the National Trust sells and put them around the garden with moss and a Vita swarm sachet in each, hoping to attract them. And a NT bird box I had around, too.
The poor beauties are going to lose their honey home when they take down the scaffolding. I have warned the workmen to be careful.
We just planted for the wildlife and not ourselves. Hubby makes the bird and hedgehog boxes, including the hog feeding station out of wood discarded and I make the bee boxes. The boxes are placed under bushes, but our south facing garden gets really hot, so the boxes stay cooler under the shrubs, don't worry, they do find them and we always put some wadding and a bit of hay in just to get the queen started, loads of info on the net how to make bee boxes, but please, if you buy one, don't buy with a glass panel for viewing, these get very hot and are a death trap for the bees, they don't like being disturbed. Make or buy some boxes without viewing, put them out early spring under shrubs, about beginning of Feb and if the queens like the look of them, they will use them, maybe not the first year, but make sure you check at the end of summer and clean them out if used, if not used leave them alone where they are, you will soon notice if they are used, extra bees in the garden and coming and going to the same location.
Posts
The intelligence that Nature provides its sons is a thing of wonder. It amazes one that they found the perfect hexagons they build their honeycombs in is the strongest structure long before humans found the mathematical fact with a mathematical proof. Even today, by mathematical laws of aerodynamics, the bumble bee with his massive body and wispy wings should not be able to get airborne or fly. But he flies beautifully anyway. They are more intelligent than us; we are just arrogant.
https://youtu.be/UNroEwFxh6I
Oh, yes. Please only help the stressed wild species indigenous to the area. It will just hurt them to introduce an outside colony.
The flowers I would include in a meadow style of planting to attract bees / other pollinators and which seem to cope reasonably well with drought would include: verbena bonariensis, ox-eye daisies (top plant!), meadow cranesbill (and other hardy geraniums), salvia caradonna, cowslips, clover, achillea, and various umbellifers such as dill.
The cheapest way to 'grow a meadow' is with a seed mix and there are some very good companies about who will make up customised mixes according to soil and aspect. If your front garden is N facing I wonder if you need a mix of plants more suited to shady areas?
Probably the most expensive (but quickest and most convenient) way to plant a meadow is with wild flower turf (ie rolls of turf with wildflowers already seeded or planted).
Personally I'd opt for the seed but also buy in a load of wild flower plug plants to get things up and running a bit quicker - especially if the seed mix didn't contain all the plants you wanted.
I would also forget about the bee hives for now and concentrate on the meadow(s). You can use the time to do a bit more research whether or not your garden would be a suitable place to keep a bee hive. It sounds a bit small to me and wild bees will set up their colonies around the garden if they like the environment.
A final point to make is that this is your front garden - and you should remember that wildflower meadows can look quite scruffy for some of the year. One of our neighbours decided to 're-wild' (slightly different to planting a wildflower meadow I know) his front garden last year and (to be honest) most of the time it's just looks like a weedy mess.
Be prepared to spend time cultivating plants of merit and pulling out thugs. I would also suggest keeping a neatly mown path around and through the meadow to make it look tidier and tended. Just my personal preference - but worth thinking about. A couple of focal point small trees or shrubs might also help to give it year-round structure.
Enjoy playing!🙂
Regular big Buttercups. They flower in early spring and are a lifesaver for that just-out-of-hybernation hungry bumbles and honey bees who love to roll in it.
Forget-me-Nots for very early flowers, also a lifesaver for hungry bees.
Poppies, various varieties. California Poppies are lovely.
Dianthus various colours
Some Nettles in a corner for butterflies to lay eggs.
Polemonium caeruleum
Phacelia attracts bees, butterflies, and ladybirds. (not my picture)
Lots more: https://www.chilternseeds.co.uk/flowers/wildflowers
You should start a Bumble Bee Lovers thread.
Other folk that share the interest can join in.
I've never been stung by a 🐝, but I have by wasps and react very badly to their stings, don't know how I would react to a honey 🐝 sting. Our garden really belongs to the birds, bees, butterflies and hedgehogs, those that stay and the visitors. We made our own Hedgehog and 🐝 boxes and this is the third year we have had colonies, but only the second year in the boxes, I was told they never use the same box twice. The only problem we have had is the wax moth that gets in and will destroy a nest, which is why we make two or three boxes each year.
We have provided every type of flower the bees love, their favourites scabious, cornflower Russian Sage and lavender, which is still in flower, loads of forget-me-nots, honeysuckle etc, it's a bee menu in both the front and back garden and we even had people coming to take photos of the front garden and all the bees and butterflies. Our wildlife pond has newts and frogs, the birds have a water cascade, pond and bird baths. The old words, you provide it and they will come is true.
I've been in touch with our local bee keeping community and just waiting for a reply.
I've added a lot of extra flowers to the meadow mix, but now we have dug over, I think there will be plenty of extra bee food next year from the plants that have self seeded.