Blackcurrant

Value to bees

Nectar

High

Pollen

Moderate

As a honey crop

Minor honey crop — a surplus only locally or occasionally

Which bees, and why

Bumblebees carry most blackcurrant pollination because they fly at temperatures that ground honey bees, and April in northern Europe is frequently too cold for the latter. Poor fruit set in a blackcurrant crop is usually a pollination problem rather than a nutritional one.

Worth knowing

A good early nectar source at a point when little else is available.

Flowering

In flower

April to May (northern hemisphere)

An early flow, frequently in weather too cool for honey bees to fly reliably.

Growing it

Conditions

Sun or light shade on rich moisture-retentive soil. It is fully hardy and wants a genuine winter chill.

Size

1.5-2 m tall and as wide.

Native range

Northern and central Europe and northern Asia. Grown commercially across Poland, Russia, Britain and New Zealand.

Suits

Small gardens, Large gardens, Orchard

• Fruits on one-year-old wood, so cut out a third of the oldest stems each winter.
• Plant deeply, several centimetres below the nursery mark, to encourage new stems from the base.
• Needs winter cold to break dormancy properly and is a poor choice in mild-winter climates.

What it looks like

An upright shrub with strongly aromatic lobed leaves and drooping racemes of small greenish flowers with reddish edges, followed by clusters of black berries.