How to Help Bumblebees Plant, Shrubs and Flowers attractive to Bumblebees

As gardeners, we cannot restore all the bees' habitat. Here are a few suggestions. 

1. The Natural History Museum's research does make it clear that gardeners can help by having a patch of nectar rich plants to create a bee friendly environment. There are lots of ideas about plants which provide nectar from early in the year to late Autumn. All round food is important to Bumblebees. Also, if you can allow part of your garden to be wild, with native wildflowers, this is a bee friendly environment. 

2. As gardeners, we can reduce our use of pesticides and sprays, and substitute organic products.

3. There has been a lot of controversy around the provenance of the plant we buy. It is all very well if we, as gardeners, stop using sprays and peat free compost. Using various insecticides on the plants defeats our objectives. It is difficult for the average gardener to know what the grower has used to bring the healthy-looking plant to market. I've noticed a growing, though limited, trend of growers providing information about plant origins. One way to be sure is to raise some plants from seed, or buy organic.

4. The so-called "Bee Friendly" plants starkly revealed this issue. The push for bee-friendly gardening led to the designation of certain plants as "Bee Friendly". Unfortunately, someone later found various insecticides sprayed on some of these "bee-friendly" plants, undermining the objective.

There is an increasing trend to buy organic plants which are raised in an eco friendly, peat free environment and, importantly, from the bees' perspective, grown without the use of chemicals. The provenance of plants is becoming important, as is now the case with the provenance of food. We are more interested in where food comes from; we need to be more interested where the bees' food comes from as well.

If you want to identify what sort of bee is in your garden, this is a great free guide from Friends of the Earth with good clear descriptions and illustrations. 

If you are interested in creating a more wildlife friendly garden, the Sunday Gardener has several pages with information about plants and shrubs which are attractive to bees and butterflies.

Check out

1. Wildlife friendly plants

2. 10 Best plants for Bees and Butterflies

3. Plants for Butterflies 

4. Spring Flowering plants attractive to Bees

5. Plants for Bees

6. How to Create a wildflower area

7. How to create a wild garden

 Having an area in the garden which is less tended, let leaf litter accumulate (good for nesting) with areas of unmown grass and native wildflowers is great for many pollinators. Bumblebees are attracted to many wild flowers, one of the best is Red Clover. The image below is of a part of my garden left over an extended period to go its own way. It does require a little attention to remove and cut back some thugs, so that there are not too many brambles, or rosebay willowherb to keep a balance.

Leaving this area to its own devices has allowed Marsh Marigolds, Red and White Campion, Nettles, Meadow Sweet, Cow Parsley, Persicaria bistorta, Primula, Foxglove, Buttercup, Daisy, Wild Flag Iris, Ivy leaved Toad Flax, wild orchid, and Ferns to take root in the wild area over the years. Into which I have also introduced Bluebells, Hellebores, Pulmonaria and Meadow Geranium.  Below is an image of part of the area in late spring showing the untended the wild area. 

Sunday gardener video about creating a wild garden.

The scientific journals suggest that ensuring there are cooler shady areas in the garden would be helpful for Bumblebees to provide a haven on hot days. Planting a mix of trees and shrubs will provide shade and also some shrubs which ameliorate the effects of pollution well worth considering.

Most male Bumblebees die off before winter leaving the Queens to overwinter in the soil. They emerge hungry, which is why early flowering plants are so productive for the bees.