Beverley Beekeepers' Association

Plants for Honey Bees

A wide variety of plants are available to all kinds of Bees but some plants are better than others for each Bee species.

The following list is what's best for Honey Bees. The plants given are also good for most other Bees but limitations of the Honey Bee anatomy mean what a Bumble can get too a Honey Bee may not.

You will quickly appreciate for growing the best plants (marked) for Honey Bees you'd need an orchard, a small piece of woodland, an area for growing fruit bushes & a meadow. Not exactly what's going to fit in most gardens. So, to give some guidance the plants best suitable for a garden are indicated and the plant type given for some idea of what's best to suit your situation.

Here is a crude guide for choosing plants & to helping plants to feed Bees,

1) Select plants that have simple open flowers, think daisy, dandelion, sunflower.
2) Plant lots of them in one place to produce an abundance of forage the Bees can locate repeatedly.
3) Provide a mixture of plants that'll flower across the seasons. e.g. celandine, crocus & snowdrops then to berberis, broom, ceanothus & aubretia etc.
4) You may already have trees & shrubs that Bees like. Consider giving them more growing room and a larger area for gowth when pruning or planting.
5) Let some herbs flower. As many as you can.

Plants are listed alphabetically. If you know the name or part of it use Ctrl-F in your browser or select from followings groups

A-B, C-D, E-K, L-O, P-S, T-Z
Best plants are marked *.      Please see notes at bottom for further table clarifications

Common Plant Name	Type	Garden Size	Flowering Time
			Feb/Mar	Apr	May	Jun	Jul	Aug	Sep/Oct
Alder	Tree	Medium/Large
Almond	Shrub	Medium/Large
Alyssum	Flower	All
Anchusa	Flower	All
Apple *	Tree	Medium/Large
Arabis	Flower	All
Ash (Pollen)	Tree	Large
Aubretia	Flower	All
Balsam	Flower	All
Beech (Pollen)	Tree	Medium/Large
Bell Heather *	Flower	All
Berberis	Shrub	All
Bergamot	Tree	Medium/Large
Bilberry	Shrub	All
Bindweed	Flower	All
Birch (Pollen)	Tree	Medium/Large
Bird's-Foot-Trefoil	Flower	All
Blackberry	Flower	All
Blackthorn or Sloe	Shrub	Medium/Large
Bluebell	Flower	All
Borage *	Flower	All
Brassicas	Flower	All
Broom	Shrub	All
Buttercup	Flower	All
Common Plant Name	Type	Garden Size	Feb/Mar	Apr	May	Jun	Jul	Aug	Sep/Oct
Campanula	Flower	All
Candytuft, annual & perennial	Flower	All
Cat Mint	Herb	All
Ceanothus	Shrub	Medium/Large
Celandine	Flower	All
Cherry *	Tree	Medium/Large
Clematis	Flower	All
Clover, Red *	Flower	All
Clover, White *	Flower	All
Crab Apple	Tree	Medium/Large
Crane's-Bill	Flower	All
Crocus	Flower	All
Crocus Autum varieties	Flower	All
Currants (All colours)	Shrub	All
Dahlia (Simple flower varieties)	Flower	All
Damson *	Tree	Medium/Large
Dandelion	Flower	All
Dead Nettle	Flower	All
Doronicum, Leopard's Bane, Plantain	Flower	All
Dwarf Gorse	Shrub	All
Common Plant Name	Type	Garden Size	Feb/Mar	Apr	May	Jun	Jul	Aug	Sep/Oct
Elm	Tree	Medium/Large
Elderberry	Tree/Shrub	Medium/Large
Escallonia	Shrub	All
Fennel	Herb	All
Field Beans	Flower	All
Figwort	Flower	All
Forget Me Not	Flower	All
Fuschia	Shrub	All
Golden Rod	Flower	All
Gooseberry	Shrub	All
Gorse	Shrub	Medium/Large
Hawthorn *	Shrub	Medium/Large
Hazel (Pollen)	Tree	Medium/Large
Hebe, flowering varieties	Shrub	All
Hogweed	Flower	None
Holly	Shrub	All
Holyhock	Flower	All
Horse Chestnut	Tree	Medium/Large
Ivy	Flower	All
Jacob's Ladder, Polemonium	Flower	All
Knapweed	Flower	All
Common Plant Name	Type	Garden Size	Feb/Mar	Apr	May	Jun	Jul	Aug	Sep/Oct
Laurel	Tree	Medium/Large
Lavender *	Flower	All
Liatris	Flower	All
Lime *	Tree	Medium/Large
Ling Heather *	Flower	All
Lucerne	Flower	All
Lupins	Flower	All
Mallow	Flower	All
Maple *	Tree	Medium/Large
Marjoram	Herb	All
Meadowsweet (Pollen)	Herb	All
Michaelmas Daisy	Flower	All
Mint	Herb	All
Mullein	Flower	All
Mustard	Herb	All
Oak	Tree	Medium/Large
Oil Seed Rape *	Flower	None
Onion	Herb	All
Oxeye Daisy	Flower	All
Common Plant Name	Type	Garden Size	Feb/Mar	Apr	May	Jun	Jul	Aug	Sep/Oct
Pear *	Tree	Medium/Large
Phacelia *	Flower	All
Plantains (not bananas)	Flower	All
Plum *	Tree	Medium/Large
Poppy (Pollen)	Flower	All
Privet	Shrub	All
Prunus	Tree/Shrub	Check species
Purple Loosestrife	Flower	All
Pyracantha	Shrub	All
Ragwort	Flower	All
Raspberry *	Flower	All
Robinia	Tree/Shrub	Check species
Rose, Rock	Shrub	All
Rose, Wild (Pollen)	Shrub	All
Rosehip, Dog Rose	Shrub	All
Rowan	Tree	Medium/Large
Sage	Herb	All
Sainfoins	Flower	All
Scabious	Flower	All
Sea Lavender	Flower	All
Snowdrop	Flower	All
Sunflowers	Flower	All
Sweet Chestnut	Tree	Medium/Large
Sycamore *	Tree	Medium/Large
Common Plant Name	Type	Garden Size	Feb/Mar	Apr	May	Jun	Jul	Aug	Sep/Oct
Thistle	Flower	All
Thrift	Flower	All
Thyme	Herb	All
Toadflax, Common	Flower	All
Traveller's Joy	Flower	All
Veronica	Flower	All
Vetch	Flower	All
Violet	Flower	All
Viper's Bugloss	Flower	All
Virginia Creeper	Shrub	All Highly invasive
Wallflower	Flower	All
White Bryony	Flower	All
Wild Clary	Flower	All
Willow	Tree	Medium/Large
Willowherbs *	Flower	All
Winter Aconite	Flower	All
Winter Heaths Winter/Spring Heathers	Flower	All
Wood Anemone	Flower	All
Wood Sage	Flower	All
Yellow Melilot Yellow Sweet Clover	Flower	All

Naming. Some plants are listed specifically by name e.g. Wallflower & some are named by plant group e.g. Prunus.
Some plants within a group are useful to Bees and in some cases a complete plant group may be useful to Bees. Also there's duplication of naming as different people may refer to the same plant by a variety of names.

Flowering Times. Allowances have been made for climate variations in the British Isles and plant variaties. When you've decided on a plant check when it's supposed to flower to see if it fits in with your plan, if you have one.