# plant attraction for bees



## mlanden

I have maybe 100+ varieties of blooming plants on my property. My honeybees go for most of them (except the mangosteen; it's Brazilian, so I wouldn't necessarily expect honeybees here in NC to "get" them). I have thousands of black-eyed Susan flowers -- and I haven't seen a honeybee on a single one yet (lots of other smaller bee species, though). Anybody have a similar experience? Or any ideas about why this would be the case? Thx ....


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## EastSideBuzz

They go for what ever flower holds the most nectar. So that flower must be the strongest.


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## twgun1

Never see bees on my black eyed Susan's or daisy's and similar plants. Mine love my borage ( reseed itself) poppy, walkers low catmint, bee balm. In my (weedy) horse pasture, I see them on the loose strife, thistle yellow clover more than flowers in my garden. My linden trees are blooming now too and so most flowers get ignored.


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## mlanden

twgun1 said:


> Never see bees on my black eyed Susan's or daisy's and similar plants. Mine love my borage ( reseed itself) poppy, walkers low catmint, bee balm. In my (weedy) horse pasture, I see them on the loose strife, thistle yellow clover more than flowers in my garden. My linden trees are blooming now too and so most flowers get ignored.


Hmmmm -- thx for that. I think that next year I'll replace-plant my b.e. Susans with herbs and things the girls like. I notice my bees are obsessed with oregano/basil blooms. They really dig ligustrum flowers, too. Totally ignore azaleas (from southeast Asia, I believe), so I'm slowing getting rid of all my zillions of azalea plants.


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## Titus_TN

mlanden said:


> Totally ignore azaleas (from southeast Asia, I believe), so I'm slowing getting rid of all my zillions of azalea plants.


Whoa, nelly. Let's not throw the baby out with the bathwater. Just because the bees don't favor the azalea isn't a reason to get rid of such a beautiful shrub. Unless you want to transplant them to my yard; then feel free.


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## mlanden

Titus_TN said:


> Whoa, nelly. Let's not throw the baby out with the bathwater. Just because the bees don't favor the azalea isn't a reason to get rid of such a beautiful shrub. Unless you want to transplant them to my yard; then feel free.


Funny -- I feel ya, bro. On my little town property, though, I decided when I bought it 15 yrs ago that ornamentals were to be phased out, and "working plants" (fruit trees, grape vines, berry bushes, herbs, bee-feeding flora, pond plants, etc, etc) were gonna be the focus. It was an order -- from God .....


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## gww

I love the internet. I have been trying to see what I have that bees like. You go to one site and they say zenia is good and then you type in what flowers do honey bees hate and up comes zenias. I have seen one bee on a zenia. I have a whole field of black eye (or brown) susan and queen anns lace and a whole bunch of little yellow clovers (weed). The yellow clover looks like black medic but isn't. I have seen one bee on queen anns lace. I have one orange butterfly weed in the three acre field and I have seen the bees working it pretty good. I see the bees tearing up the corn pollen but not on any flower. 
I am feeding now cause they seemed to quit drawing comb and started hitting my garden. 

The internet says they won't work a red flower but it seems that they really like crimsom clover which seems to be pretty red but I don't have any. Mine is all red clover which is purple. I will say that the bumble bees and butterflys seem to like all the stuff I have.

I got enough honey suckle that it is killing off trees in the woods. They should have to change the name of that plant if bees don't like it. Honey suckle is a bit miss leading

I find that looking up what might be good and that I know grows here is pretty time consuming and what you find you don't know which contradictory thing to believe. I have watched the bees and except for the sweetgum tree in the spring when they are all together on it, I don't see how they survive. I can't find them on anything in numbers that make me think they are getting fed.
I have enjoyed this thread and hope more poeple who do know add to it.
Thanks
gww


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## m0dem

It's kinda like my carrot plants that went to seed. There were literally hundreds of native pollinators (many of which I had never seen) on only a couple carrot plants, but I only ever saw 1 single honey bee.
I think that is an indication of a good flow, but when the flow drops off (if your flowers are still around) they might start exploring other options.


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## gww

m0dem
I might believe that but they had slowed down drawing comb and all my yard clover had dried up. I would think but am plenty new enough not to know, that now would be a good time for bees to hit the flowers. 

My yard clover had dried up due to lack of rain. I will say that I was in town and the bees were all over some white clover that was in a yard but I never saw them on my white yard clover. Mine yard clover did not look near as healthy as the stuff in town. We finaly got a rain today and in half a days time I saw a few white clover blumes. I have my fingers crossed. I hope to learn a but more before I get tired of watching them every day. Yea, I am new.
gww


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## beepro

Has anyone planted sweet annie before?
It is an herb that smells nice too!
My coworker said when they bloomed the bees were all over them.
Maybe the native bees work on them too.


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## photobiker

A plant we have growing that is loved by bees, all bees, is Mountain Mint. Grows about 3 feet tall and spreads at a moderate rate, which we like. It grows from, according to the "net", Maine to Florida to Texas. For us it is just coming into bloom and will continue for a month and a half to 2 months.

As for Zinnias, the butterfly love them. Our focus is planting for honeybees but we plant for pollinators in general. We know we can't plant enough on our 1/2 acre to make a real difference to the bees but it is our little part.


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## Johnnycake

Ditto what photobiker said. Mountain Mint is AMAZING!!! Mine just started to bloom about 2 days ago and it is covered with pollinators - honey bees, Bumbles, wasps, all sorts of other bees, etc. I can't recommend this one enough. It runs and can easily be transplanted. I've put it in all over and the next year it really comes back strong.

Other great thing about it, is you can use it as misquito repellent. I only use it, nothing else. Take a leaf, and rub it on your skin - Native American origin as that use I think.


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## beepro

I would like to see a pic of your mountain mint up close of the leaves.
Maybe this may help me to identify it better. Any pics to post?


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## photobiker

Went out an shot one for you this morning. I was talking to another beekeeper yesterday and we started talking about mountain mint. He said he knew that bee really like it but wasn't sure what the honey would taste like. Since it is not an exclusive source for the honey I don't think it really matters.

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## beepro

I'm pretty sure your mountain mint is very much different
from the ones I have here. One is a frilly leaves and the other is a
narrower leaves type. They're not the one on this pic. Are there more than
one different species around?
So what do I have then?


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## Joe Mac

twgun1 said:


> Mine love my borage ( reseed itself)


How long have you had your borage and does it really reseed good? I just ordered 5 pounds of borage seeds that I plan to plant next spring. How long does it take to bloom and how long does it bloom?


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## photobiker

Beepro, this variety grows from Maine to Florida and as far west as Texas


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## clyderoad

gww said:


> ....... I hope to learn a but more before I get tired of watching them every day. Yea, I am new.
> gww


Not right in your backyard but this may prove helpful:
www.in.gov/dnr/entomolo/files/ep-Gardening_for_Honey_Bees.pdf


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## gww

clyderoad
Thanks for the link. I have been in the house and on the computer quite a bit latly due to the heat.
gww


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## Phoebee

I puzzled over these issues for a couple of years. We had all these supposedly good forage plants but the bees didn't seem to use most of them, or they worked them only at select times, even though other pollinators were working the flowers. They don't go for solitary flowers, except when they do.

Recruiting behavior is part of it. Other pollinators don't have a remarkable dance by which they can recruit foragers to the best sources. This explains much of why honeys seem to focus on rich patches of a particular species, at a particular time. Once one honey bee locates a good source, the word spreads fast. I don't think any other pollinator has a comparable system.

The remarkable communication between flowers and bees, and how well honeybees in particular pick up the cues, is part of it. Flowers signal nectar availability via smell and using colors we can't even see. They'll change color in the UV over a period of a few minutes to signal that nectar is present, and bees are adapted to see it. Most recently, bumblebees (and almost certainly also honeybees) have been shown to sense electrostatic charge on flowers.

So the bees know things about flowers that we don't, and in fact _can't_, unless we extend our senses with instruments. We're sitting around scratching our heads in ignorance, and these little insects with less that a million neurons in their brains are total experts on the subject.


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## clyderoad

Phoebee said:


> So the bees know things about flowers that we don't, and in fact _can't_, unless we extend our senses with instruments. We're sitting around scratching our heads in ignorance, and these little insects with less that a million neurons in their brains are total experts on the subject.


Total experts?
There is no denying their expertise regarding plants (and bugs) that provide them what they need, pollen, nectar, propolis.
As for the rest of the plant world that doesn't provide them a resource......


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## cervus

Phoebee said:


> The remarkable communication between flowers and bees, and how well honeybees in particular pick up the cues, is part of it. Flowers signal nectar availability via smell and using colors we can't even see. They'll change color in the UV over a period of a few minutes to signal that nectar is present, and bees are adapted to see it. Most recently, bumblebees (and almost certainly also honeybees) have been shown to sense electrostatic charge on flowers.


And flowers are just one facet of the whole "nectar network". This article describes something equally astonishing. It's absolutely amazing to see bees working plants that have no flowers with the same fervor as they work blooms.


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