At this time of the year my garden is overflowing with flowering snow crocuses. I imagine they were planted by the English lady who lived in the house some 60 years ago, and spread over the years to cover every corner of the backyard. These crocuses, smaller and wilder than the hybrid ones you can buy at garden centres today, are probably the original wild crocuses native to Europe.
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| Honeybee in the sea of snow crocuses. |
On a sunny day they attract large number of honeybees, hungry for some fresh pollen and nectar after the long winter.
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| European honeybee worker collecting pollen. |
Crocuses are also popular with drone flies (Eristalis tenax, introduced from Europe), mimics of honeybees.
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| The drone fly, a European hoverfly, is widely established in North America. |
Now, I don't care much about honeybees or drone flies since they are nowhere to be seen around my flowering fruit trees or blueberry bushes, let alone tomato plants, when they need pollination. From what I've seen, various native bees are the main pollinators in my food garden. Apart from feeding me apples and plums, native bees provide a crucial service, pollinating native plants so they can set seeds, procreate and provide food for insects, birds and other animals in our ecosystem.
That is why I got excited when I noticed, among all those honeybees, two bumblebee queens, stumbling about from flower to flower, still drowsy and weak from a long winter hibernation. They must have spent the winter buried in the soil somewhere in my backyard, since they were not able to fly for long or far. These bumblebee queens, born at the end of last summer, are the only surviving members of their colonies. As soon as the weather becomes more consistently warm, they will start their own nests. Here they are, searching for nectar to gain much needed energy.
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| Black-tailed Bumblebee queen (Bombus melanopygus). |
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| Yellow-faced bumblebee queen (Bombus vosnesenskii). |
Early flowering plants are of great importance for emerging bumblebee queens. However, not all plants that you see flowering at this time are providing nectar for bees. For instance, daffodils or forsythias have a pretty face, but, much like plastic plants, are totally useless in providing any food for local wildlife. If you live on the Pacific Northwest coast and care about the survival and well-being of our native bumblebees, plant some early flowering and nectar rich plants, like Indian Plum (Oemleria cerasiformis), a native bush that is in flower in Vancouver right now. Another great native bush getting ready to flower is Red-flowering Currant (Ribes sanguineum). Unlike crocuses, these bushes will also provide nectar for overwintering Anna's hummingbirds, as well as berries which are loved by birds.
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| One of the two Indian Plums I planted last year is still too small to flower. For berries, you must plant both male and female plants. |
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| Red-flowering current flower buds. |
