The Bee Garden is buzzing!
The Backyard Bee garden, designed especially for Barking Riverside’s bees is buzzing with life.
The wildflowers are all thriving and are covered in bees of all types. Even the rare bumblebee, the brown banded carder bee has been spotted:
It’s important to provide wildflowers in your garden that flower throughout the year, Pussy Willow and fruit trees are great. The buff tailed bumblebee is one of the first bees to emerge from hibernation, so it is important to provide nectar in your garden all through the year. In the Backyard Bee garden, we have planted all sorts of trees along with herbs and other wildflowers that flower at different times in the year. We have also prepared nesting habitat in the form of a meadow, a compost heap and bare sandy south facing banks, as different bees have different nesting requirements.
We also have the largest bee hotel in the world, which was written about in the Observer on 7th August 2011:
A common carder bee was also recorded foraging in the garden:
