Rockrose

Value to bees

Nectar

High

Pollen

Very high

As a honey crop

Major honey crop — yields a surplus in good years

Which bees, and why

Worked hard in the morning while the flowers last, and largely abandoned by afternoon. Bees also collect the labdanum resin directly from the leaves for propolis, which is why a cistus hillside is busy even when nothing is in flower.

Large fully open flowers with exposed nectar and pollen — as accessible as forage gets.

Worth knowing

An outstanding pollen source and a good nectar one, and a plant that also supplies resin for propolis — an unusual triple contribution.

Flowering

In flower

April to June (northern hemisphere)

A late spring flow. Cistus is fire-adapted, and a burn is followed by exceptional flowering two to four years later as the seedbank germinates.

When nectar flows

Individual flowers last only hours, so the plant relies on producing them in overwhelming numbers. Pollen is offered in enormous quantity from a dense boss of stamens.

Year-to-year variation

Reliable where cistus dominates, which across much of Extremadura and the Alentejo is a great deal of ground.

What it does to the honey

Cistus nectar gives the honey its balsamic, incense-like warmth and a faint smokiness. It is one of relatively few honeys where the plant's own resinous aromatic carries into the jar essentially intact.

Growing it

Conditions

Full sun, sharp drainage, poor stony soil. Short-lived and intolerant of winter wet and of root disturbance.

Size

1-2.5 m.

Native range

The western Mediterranean — Iberia, southern France and North Africa.

Suits

Large gardens, Small gardens

• Buy small plants and do not move them — cistus resents root disturbance and rarely recovers from it.
• Do not prune into old wood. It will not regenerate from bare stems.
• Short-lived by shrub standards, often eight to twelve years, so plan on replacing it rather than rejuvenating it.

What it looks like

A dense evergreen shrub with narrow dark sticky leaves and very large white five-petalled flowers, usually with a deep maroon blotch at the base of each petal, opening at dawn and shedding by afternoon.