Bee Wildflower Seed Mix

Please visit our sister site British Wildflower Meadow Seeds if you want less seed than advertised here or if your intended purchases come to under our £100 basket minimum.

Bee Wildflower Seed Mix

About This Seed Mix

Honeybees tend to grab the headlines in the bee world, but there are lots of bumblebees and solitary bees which need our help - arguably more so. There are a lot of them - 240 odd types of solitary bee and 24 bumblebees - and they all have different life cycles and adaptations. They have different lengths of tongue, for example, and emerge at different times of year.

Perhaps unsurprisingly, however, with the exception of the honeybee they all seem to prefer our native wildflowers when they can forage from them. Just the kind of flowers which are increasingly rare. The challenge is to try to give them - and you - lots of different types of wildflowers with a nice long flowering window, with lots of good looking wildflowers too. We hope this selection will do the trick, and work for as wide a range of bees as possible. We've included annuals, a biannual, and perennials. The flowering sequence ends in August with knapweed. These wildflowers won't just be popular with you and the bees; they will also attract other pollinators like hoverflies and butterflies.

This mix can be added to grassed areas in some instances - see our blog for guidance. It's expensive as it just consists of wildflowers, but the good news is it needs sowing at super low rates. 

Like all our wildflower seed, all the species in this mix have British provenance. This mix is freshly harvested from what were originally wild populations in the UK. No agricultural cultivars or any nonsense.

Management

You won't need to do very much with your bee friendly area. If it has grass in it, manage as you would a meadow. Otherwise it's up to you; deadhead and tidy in late summer if you like, to keep it tidy over the winter. Hoick out any pernicious weeds like dock before they set seed.

Smaller Areas

If you need less than 500g of this mix, head over to our sister site, British Wildflower Meadow Seeds for smaller packets down to 20g.

Wildflower Species (100%):

Field poppy (Papaver rhoeas) 14.3%

Cornflower (Centaurea cyanus) 14.3%

Wild marjoram (Oreganum vulgare) 7.1%

Vipers bugloss (Echium vulgare) 14.3%

Betony (Betonica officinalis) 14.3%

Tufted vetch (Vicia cracca) 14.3%

Devils-bit scabious (Succisa pratensis) 7.1%

Common knapweed (Centaurea nigra) 14.3%

Suppliers: All Things Rural 

Sowing rate: 1g to 2g per square metre.