Bees Needs, National Pollinator Week

Did you know there are more than 1500 species of pollinating insects living in the UK?

Bees Needs and National Pollinator Week highlight the importance of pollinating insects. Taking a week in July to spread the word across the UK is part of the ten-year National Pollinator Strategy to improve the environment so it is more supportive of bees and other pollinators.

Roughly a third of the food we eat is put in our mouths as a result of pollination. For pollination to occur, there needs to be a vector – which is the pollinator. Bees are probably the most obvious contender, but pollinating insects also include butterflies, moths, hoverflies, wasps, flies and beetles!

Bee populations are under threat worldwide from viral disease but also from a reduction in the number of flowering plants found in the countryside as a result of changing farming practices. Bumble bees, honey bees, mason bees, miner bees and solitary bees have specific needs. This includes food – pollen and nectar and a home for shelter.

As a result of the way the landscape has changed over the last 50 or more years, not all insect pollinators can readily find the food and shelter they need.

Bees Needs Food and a Home – what can we do in our gardens that makes a difference?

Five ways you can help with Bees Needs and Pollinating Insects

1. Plant More Flowers

Not just any old flowers though. They should be rich in nectar and pollen which should be easily available to the pollinating insects. Different pollinators require different shapes of flower; indeed some will only visit to feed on (and therefore pollinate) particular flower or plant groups.

Single flowered forms are often the best; the open flower gives easy access to the pollen for bees. By comparison, butterflies like to stick their long tongue or proboscis into tubular flowers.

2. Let it Grow Wild

A nettle clump with some native species wild flowers in a corner of the garden may be all that’s needed to provide cover – a home – and food for pollinating insects.

3. Cut Grass less often

This allows nectar rich flowers such as clover to grow and provide a food source. However, if you suffer from hay fever, be sure to mow before the flowers form on the grass.

4. Leave Nests and Hibernation spots undisturbed

Not always an easy thing to do in a small garden that has many demands being made on it already. But perhaps making a bee hotel with your children over the summer would be an enjoyable pastime?

Solitary bees overwinter in the hollow tubes of bee hotels and finding a quieter corner of the garden to set it in could be just what the bees needs.

5. Ask Yourself – do you really need to use that Pesticide?

Stop using chemical pesticides (to kill pests) and herbicides (to kill weeds). Try the proven system of IPM, or Integrated Pest Management. This would at the least reduce the amount of chemicals used in the garden and allotment.

What else can you do for Bees and Pollinators?

A selection of different types of plants in your garden and on the allotment is the best way to encourage bees and other beneficial wildlife such as predators. It also helps generally to discourage pests, weeds and diseases by creating a biodiverse habitat.

Whilst the number of insect pollinators is highest in the summer coinciding with peak plant growth and supplies of nectar and pollen, they are around throughout most of the year. Try growing early and late flowering plants so you’re offering a food source to the widest number of pollinating insects possible.

Some good Plants for Pollinators

A few suggestions – you need to choose flowers, trees shrubs and flowering bulbs that suit you and your garden soil. For an individual planting design drop us an email! We can create long distance bespoke designs using email, skype and phone if that suits your budget better than a visit.

Summer Plants for Pollinators

Achillea species, yarrow

Buddleia – ‘butterfly bush’

Lavender

Nepeta species, catmint

Salvia – both ornamental and the culinary sage

Autumn Plants for Pollinators

Anemone x hybrida, Japanese anemone

Colchicum, autumn crocus

Dahlias

Rudbeckia

Tilia henryana, lime, late flowering

Winter Plants for Pollinators

Eranthis hyemalis, winter aconite

Hellebore, winter flowering

Lonicera purpusii, winter flowering honeysuckle

Snowdrops, Galanthus nivalis

Sarcococca, sweet box

Spring Plants for Pollinators

Fruit tree blossom

Geranium species

Primrose, Primula vulgaris

Sweet Violets, Viola oderata

Muscari, grape hyacinth

Support your local Bee Keepers. Local honey seems to be good for hay fever sufferers too, by reducing the severity of some of their symptoms.
Did you know that 6.5kg of ‘Whitehall Honey’ was produced by the first yield from Defra’s beehives in 2015?

Declining bee and pollinating insect populations is a worldwide problem. We need bees or we will starve. Seventy of the 100 crop species that provide 90% of food worldwide are pollinated by bees.

This affects everyone, and we are all connected. Kew Gardens are helping African farmers to manage their field margins so that wild pollinators can help improve crop yields.