Pollination ?.

This year I was given a gift of 4 packets of Carters Nasturtiums which I have never grown in the garden before.
I planted them ,March/April, in pots and anywhere there was space. I also planted 6 Lilac shrubs. I was extremely surprised ,even with the wet weather we have had this year,the number of bees visiting the garden.I have had more bees this year than any other year,which is not the norm this year with the weather we have had.
This year my pear tree is bearing fruit for the first time,I have had the tree for 7 years. The apple trees are heavy with fruit this year,I would say the most they have yielded annually in the 7 years planted.
My question is, could the planting of the Nasturtiums and Lavender,which has attracted more bees ,have any bearing on the increase in fruit yield on the trees.

I don't Know Much About Bees, I Know A Lot About Birds----Been Out With A Few.

 

Absolutely Music, more bees, more polination

 

My thinking is that the fruit would have already 'set' in the spring but planting anything that encourages the Bees can only be for the good

 

I always grow nasturtium for the bees. Strangely, it rarely appears in the various lists of 'bee friendly' plants, yet in my experience its one of the most reliable and popular bee diners.

Bees are clever things. Clever enough for scientists to study them carefully. Bee behaviour has been studied with a view to improving sat nav software, all manner of problem solving algorithms, and last I heard, forensics were interested because the patterns of bee flight had a remarkable resemblance to the movements of repeat criminals Bottom line, bees are very efficient at working out how to get the most pollen and nectar for the least effort, so if you grow something that reliably feeds them over a long period, then they will do all their shopping in your garden, pollinating everything else.

Nasturtium is a safe bet for that, as it not only has a long period of profuse flowering, but also most of the flowers appear beneath the canopy of broad waxy leaves. This means that unlike many other flowers, nasturtiums are still useful in the pouring rain as the pollen and nectar doesn't get washed out, and the bees can work in favourable conditions.

 

I like the repeat criminal bit.

 

http://alevelpsychology.co.uk/news/latest/forensic-psychology-bees-help-to-find-serial-killers.html

 

We use simliar profileing when detecting spammers on GC. Someone might seem as nice as pie when posting, but if they are saying that they live in texas but their ip address is in vietnam then we start to think they may be fibbing.

 

Do some bumble bees lie about where they've come from? The cheeky little so and sos.

 

If you accidentaly trap a bee in your car & drive it 50 miles away, it will go to the nearest hive and ask if it can join. They will let it in.

 

I'm still well impressed with 'Sniffer Bees'

 

You've lost me Zigs

 

Yep, wrong smiley, off to bed now before I do it again x

 

I was going to capture some bees and put them in the greenhouse to polinate the tomatoes,
I admit I did not do it incase they became lost from their hive (I am a bit soft and considerate)
So as they can get B and B elsewhere I will grab some tomorrow

Jack McH

 

Commercial growers actually buy bumblebees to trap inside their giant greenhouses

http://www.organiccatalogue.com/p3236/BUMBLEBEE-COLONY/product_info.html

The trouble is, bumble bees don't nest close to their foraging areas (scientists theorise that this is because they they want their nests away from the site where they advertise their presence, which makes sense). That means that although the bees have plenty of food during the pollination period, they have nowhere to breed and raise young.

Trapping a few bees in the greenhouse for a few days at a time is almost certainly fine though, as long as they don't get baked or dehydrated.