Thursday, December 9, 2010

Bee Banquet in My Garden

My summer garden has plenty of bee flowers - allissium that comes up everywhere, including the cracks in the path, roses, queen anns lace, herbs including sage, borage, comphry,hyssop and lavender . There are citrus also, with their divinely smelling blossom scenting the garden and a rather wide feijoa bush absolutely smothered in flowers,( see previous post) that has been pollinated largely by blackbirds and starlings ! it is the first time I have seen birds all over a fruit tree when in flower, they actually peck at the flowers so hope I get fruit !

The hollyhocks this year are amazing ! Dark and light pink saucer shaped blooms starting from the bottom of the stem, taller then I am and having to be tied back from falling all over the path.
All these plants are self seeded, growing down the edge of the driveway making backing out abit hairy if I don`t want to collect the flowers in my side mirror ! I have noticed the bees seem to favor the lighter coloured flowers, the bumblebees also have a picnic in my garden at the moment, I am going to stagger the planting so there is something flowering till autumn.

3 comments:

Cabbage Tree Farm said...

Beautiful hollyhocks!

Bentham Bees said...

A feast fit for a Queen and all of her retinue! ;-)

http://www.beekeepingguidelines.com/beekeeping-clothing/ said...

What a lovely bee garden you have. So I see in one of your pictures that you have a top bar bee hive. I'm just curious, how many do you own and how are your bees keeping up?
Thanks!