Bees and Honey: Get your garden buzzing

Stephen Jones is a beekeeper from Windsor.

He will be doing a regular blog for us on all things bees and honey related.

Now is a critical time for the bees - their stores of honey are low and they have run out of pollen. Without pollen they can't raise brood to replace the old bees, so the colony's survival is at stake. Hardly surprising then that on chilly dry days the bees are out when the rest of us would rather remain indoors!

It's easy to see what they are foraging on by looking at the colour of the pollen collected on their back legs; grey-white means they've been on the snowdrops, bright orange the crocuses, bright yellow is mahonia, and greeny-yellow pollen is from the hellebores.

Yet what is the most widely grown spring flower? The daffodil - pretty, but useless. In fact most flowers grown in the typical English garden are pretty, ... but useless, which is why this spring I'm giving further thought to how to make my garden even more insect pollinator friendly.

It's not as simple as growing plants that are 'Perfect for Pollinators'. Plants that are covered with bees in one location can be totally ignored when grown in my garden. Past 'failures' include agastache, monarda and asters. I don't know if it's the soil, or lack of moisture, or simply that the bees have better pickings elsewhere.

There have been successes: eryngium, solidago, lythrum, erysium, and verbena, but I want my garden humming so I'm always trying something new. This year I'm sowing honeywort (cerinthe), sweet rocket (hesperis), and vipers bugloss (echium) and sneezeweed (helenium autumnale). With luck they will germinate and flourish and be crawling with bees and butterflies.

If you want to help insect pollinators forget those pretty but useless flowers. It's a critical time for bees - so plan to get your garden buzzing.

Please comment if you have any plant suggestions or success stories - either in the comment box below or using the Facebook link.

Visit the Windsor bees and honey blogspot and Windsor Honey facebook page