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Matchgrip - any luck attracting bees?

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Posted by kiddo_1 NE OH 5 (My Page) on
Mon, Dec 29, 08 at 11:39

Hello matchgrip,

I've been very curious to know if you found ways to entice bees to your gardens? I posted a suggestion to your original question (Aug 2008) and have been interested to see how you fared? I had good luck bringing bees to my pollinator gardens this past year (2008) with just a few new efforts on my part. If you have had success, would you please share it? I'm always looking for good ideas for my honeybee sanctuary/pollinator gardens here at Melissa Majora.
Thanks & good luck in the new year. :-)
Kris

Here is a link that might be useful: The Gardens at Melissa Majora - a honeybee sanctuary

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RE: Matchgrip - any luck attracting bees?

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Three suggestions:
1) bees are attracted to blue flowers, so blue hyssop, borage, Pride of Madeira, etc. are good choices.
2) bees need alot of flowers, so if you have a mass of flowers, they'll be more attracted to your yard than if you have a flower here and a flower there.
3) certain flowers seem to be magnets for bees, probably because of their nectar. One example is basil. Bees swarm all over my basil with an eagerness that is absent in their behavior around neighboring flowers of other types.

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RE: Matchgrip - any luck attracting bees?

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Thanks for those good suggestions, thisbud4u. I did let my basil bloom last year and it got a good deal of honeybee and solitary bee traffic. Funny thing, the blossoms must not be well attached because most of the time when a bee landed on one, the tiny bloom fell off. Hyssop. Oh yes, I must get some of that! :-)
Kris

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RE: Matchgrip - any luck attracting bees?

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Hi thisBud4u

I noticed you mentioned in point 3 that bees are swarming all over your basil with little eagerness for the surrounding flowers. I'm noticing the same thing with my basil, except it hasn't gone to flower yet. All they do is fly around the leaves and sit on the soil! Would you know why this happens? I can understand the pollen behaviour, but not the soil!!

Cheers :)

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RE: Matchgrip - any luck attracting bees?

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Bees need moisture & minerals like us & can use soil for both at times. Might even be Mason bees (?) that use mud in hive & make no wax. The herb Borage has bees also attracted to it's bluish flowers & my flowering plant is covered w/ em.

Cheers, David

  
 

 

 


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