The BBC have a lovely slideshow today showing pictures taken in an experimental garden aiming to discover which flowering plants bees and other pollinators prefer. The project, at the University of Sussex, is in the second of three years and initial results suggest that the best flowers attract more than a hundred times the number of pollinators as the worst.
If it’s honeybees you’re after then plant borage – the study shows it attracts more of them than any other plant. Back in 2005 when I took part in a Garden Organic experiment looking at beneficial insects, I found that phacelia was good for attracting bees, but that borage was better for ladybirds and their larvae.
This new study also backs up the idea that complex flowers attract fewer insects than the simpler varieties, but it’s only concentrating on July and August (apparently the time of year when bees have to travel furthest to forage).
Which plants in your garden attract the most bees and other insects? Are you trying new ones this year?
Rae of sunshine wrote:
...on Sun, Feb 19 '12 (88 days ago)