Hi,

Sorry, I don't know much about Lavender, but I looked up a few things for you.

ÂAmerican Honey Plants by Frank C. Pellett, states:
"In Italy, L. officinalis ,,,, is regarded as extremely valuable to the beekeeper"

Also an Australian publication ÂSelect Extra-Tropical Plants by Von Mueller: ",,,estimates that a ton of the finest flavored honey can be obtained annually from an acre of L. stoechas. This species is recommended to stay sand."

PS. I find "a ton" of honey annually a bit hard to believe,, but thatÂs what this Von guy wrote.

Charleen Barr
Colorado State University Cooperative Extension Master Gardener recomends:
lavender- Lavandula angustifolia

That's all I have, hope it helps.

Here is a link that might be useful: Bee Benefit Plants

By chance I've just found a 3 Sept 04 newspaper article lurking in my recipe book. The Otago Daily Times (New Zealand) gardening columnist Wally Richards recommends 2 new varieties of lavender - Bella and Bee. Both flower for most of the year, right from early Spring. We're having a cool summer this year in NZ, and need more bees around right now to fertilise our runner beans - I'm thinking about getting a beehive! As Wally says "Many of our other 'highly attractive' or bee palnts don't flower until later in the season - and its not much good when the time for pollination is past."

I've got about 900 lavender plants in SW Michigan and I have yet to find a type that honeybees don't like. In my area, I can grow forms of basic English lavender -- L. angustifolia, also sometimes called L. vera/L. officinalis/L.spica -- and also lavandins, various sterile hybrids of L. angustifolia and L. latifolia, such as 'Grosso' and Provence.'

I'd suggest getting a few different varieties to extend your season. If you were growing near to me, I'd suggest the variety 'Hidcote,' which does not have the strongest scent, but does have a great, deep, color, and is usually the first to bloom. Next, for us, come the first plants of straight L. angustifolia. Then comes the lavandin 'Provence.'

With a few dozen each of these three, you should be able to attract thousands of bees over a period of several weeks. You can add other varieties to smooth out the volume of bloom or extend it a bit: Grosso and Twickle Purple would be good for this purpose.

If you want to harvest lavender and provide a lot of food to a lot of bees, increase the number of plants; the best time for harvest is when the first flower begins to open on a lavender stalk.

In South Africa, you can grow a much wider range of species than I can, but I think the general principle would still apply, as far as feeding bees is concerned. Choose a range of plants with different, but overlapping, bloom periods and plant enough to attract bees in a major way, keeping in mind that you and the bees may have competing interests. In our fields, there are so many plants in bloom at one time that when I grab a bunch of stems to harvest, the bees just move on. BTW, bumblebees will also be major visitors.

I agree with Neil Allen that most lavender species and varieties are attractive to honey bees. Large concentrations of flowers will be especially sought after. Dead-heading plants will encourage re-blooming, if other conditions are good. Lavandula angustifolia 'Munstead' and 'Hidcote', and L. 'Provence' do well in our area. It's important to have well-drained soil, especially where winters are wet. Maintaining a site that has continuous bloom with overlapping species/varieties is another outstanding suggestion. I also suggest that growers don't fertilize with high nitrogen fertilizer in late wummer/early fall in cold climate areas, as it discouragfes dormancy.

Ohio State University Extension and the Tri-County Beekeepers Association cooperatively manage a honey bee plant garden (public demonstration garden) that currently has about 65 plant taxa. The website (out-of-date but accessible, currently being revised) is linked below.

Here is a link that might be useful: The Ohio State University Honey Bee Laboratory