Angelica

Value to bees

Nectar

Very high

Pollen

High

As a honey crop

Minor honey crop — a surplus only locally or occasionally

Which bees, and why

Enormous umbels of tiny open flowers, accessible to essentially every insect. An angelica in flower will hold small solitary bees, hoverflies, parasitic wasps, beetles and flies simultaneously, and it is one of the best plants there is for watching insect diversity.

Enormous domed umbels of tiny completely open flowers, with nothing hidden and nothing requiring a long tongue.

Worth knowing

An outstanding and extremely accessible nectar and pollen source, and one of the best single plants for insect diversity in a garden.

Flowering

In flower

June to August (northern hemisphere)

An early summer flow in its second year, after which the plant dies.

Growing it

Conditions

Sun or part shade on damp rich soil. It needs moisture and dislikes dry ground.

Size

1.5-2.5 m tall in its second year.

Native range

Northern and eastern Europe and Central Asia, on damp ground, riverbank and mountain meadow.

Suits

Large gardens, Meadow or wildflower area, Small gardens

• Biennial or short-lived: it makes leaves for a year or two, flowers spectacularly, and dies. Let it self-seed.
• Sow fresh seed — angelica seed loses viability within months.
• Cut the flower head before it seeds if you want to keep the plant alive another year, though this removes the whole point.

What it looks like

A very large biennial with hollow ribbed stems and huge domed umbels of tiny greenish-white flowers, above large deeply divided leaves.