Lavender

Value to bees

Nectar

Very high

Pollen

Moderate

As a honey crop

Major honey crop — yields a surplus in good years

Which bees, and why

Worked heavily by almost everything. The tubular florets are short enough for honey bees to reach, which is not true of every plant in the mint family, and the dense spike lets a bee work dozens of flowers without flying — a highly efficient forage shape.

Corolla tube is short enough for short-tongued bees, so lavender is genuinely accessible to the full range rather than only to long-tongued bumblebees.

Worth knowing

An unusually good nectar plant relative to its pollen offering. Bees visiting lavender are mostly there for nectar, which is why it supports adult foragers well and contributes less to brood rearing.

Flowering

In flower

June to August (northern hemisphere)

Lavandin flowers two to four weeks later than true lavender, so planting both extends the season considerably.

When nectar flows

Secretes best in full sun and heat. A cool, wet July substantially reduces both the nectar and the scent.

Year-to-year variation

Reliable for garden bees almost every year, but a honey crop only where lavender is grown at field scale. Nectar secretion drops sharply in cool weather.

What it does to the honey

The honey carries the plant's own aromatic compounds almost intact, which is unusual — most honeys taste of honey with a suggestion of the flower, while lavender honey tastes recognisably of lavender. It is the clearest single demonstration on the site of nectar chemistry surviving into flavour.

Growing it

Conditions

Full sun, sharply drained poor soil, and no winter wet. It dies of damp far more often than of cold.

Size

40-80 cm for English lavender; up to 1 m for lavandin.

Native range

The western Mediterranean — Spain, southern France and Italy — on dry limestone hillsides.

Suits

Containers and window boxes, Small gardens, Large gardens, Farm scale

Maintenance, and the bit that matters

Timing matters for bees. Pruning after flowering is correct; shearing in early summer to keep a neat shape removes the entire year's forage.

• Poor soil produces better plants than rich soil: fed lavender grows soft, flops and is short-lived.
• Prune immediately after flowering, cutting back into the current year's growth but never into old bare wood, which will not resprout.
• Replace plants every 8-10 years — they become woody and sparse whatever you do.
• Grows well in a pot, which makes it the single best balcony bee plant there is.

What it looks like

A woody-based evergreen subshrub with narrow grey-green leaves and dense spikes of small tubular flowers, usually violet-blue but also white and pink. Lavandin (L. × intermedia) is larger, later and more vigorous, with branched flower spikes.