- Top Tip 1: Create a bumblebee-friendly garden
- Top Tip 2: Preserve natural nest sites
- Top tip 3: Build nesting aids for bumblebees
When was the last time you were allowed to admire a bumblebee in the garden? High time to invite the important pollinators into a bumblebee-friendly garden with targeted measures. In this guide you will read the best tips on how to successfully attract bumblebees.
Bumblebees love lavender
Top Tip 1: Create a bumblebee-friendly garden
The first step on the way to a bumblebee-friendly garden is to consistently avoid chemicals. You can only attract bumblebees successfully if neither pesticides nor artificial fertilizers turn beds or lawns into poison-mined areas. In the second step, give preference to native wild perennials in the planting plan, which give hungry bumblebees an abundance of nectar and pollen. The following overview gives important details on how to attract bumblebees correctly:
- Plant diseases heal with biological preparations or natural remedies (e.g. milk against apple powdery mildew)
- Fight pests with home remedies (e.g. soft soap solution against aphids)
- Pull weeds and do not destroy them with chemical sprays
- Create compost to produce organic plant fertilizer yourself
- Sow bee pastures and plant forage plants for bumblebees
Forage plants for bumblebees
Bumblebees are wild about native wildflowers, herbs and flowering shrubs. If you want to attract bumblebees permanently, these plants should not be missing in the garden:
| Forage plants bumblebees | botanical name | Location recommendation |
|---|---|---|
| broad bean | Vicia faba | Vegetable patch |
| common columbine | Aquilegia vulgaris | flower bed, balcony |
| blackberry, raspberry | Rubus ssp. | orchard |
| sedum | sedum | drywall |
| mulleins | verbascum | perennial bed |
| lavender | lavender | rock garden |
| blackthorn | Prunus spinosa | hedge, enclosure |
| hawthorn | Crataegus | cottage garden |
| sweet peas | vicia | facade greening |
Top Tip 2: Preserve natural nest sites
There is often still ice and snow when the bumblebee queens are looking for a suitable location for their little colony. Hobby gardens that can serve with natural nesting sites are now clearly in the lead. These include tree cavities, abandoned mouse nests in the ground, quarry stone walls, mixed flower hedges, dry stone walls and deadwood hedges. By refraining from intensive tillage, erecting garden walls made of natural stone without joints and piling up dead wood for the hedge, you can successfully lure bumblebees into your green kingdom.
Top tip 3: Build nesting aids for bumblebees
Is there a lack of natural nesting sites in the garden? Then give nature a helping hand and build artificial nesting aids to attract bumblebees looking for a home. Be inspired by the following ideas:
- Create earth nesting caves (you can find great building instructions at wildbienen.de)
- Drill an entrance hole in the flower clay pot, close the bottom hole, fill in nesting material (bark mulch, leaves, chopped shrub cuttings), cover with a heavy saucer, set up out of the rain
- Hang up bird nesting aids and convert them into bumblebee nesting boxes (instructions at wildbienen.de)
Beginners who try to get bumblebees to visit their garden are on the safe side with ready-made bumblebee nesting boxes. There is a wide range of tried and tested models to choose from in specialist shops. In order to reliably attract bumblebees, nesting aids you have built or bought yourself must be ready for occupancy by March 1st at the latest.
tips
As a balcony gardener, you can easily attract bumblebees with a miniature bee-friendly garden. If you plant a box or bucket with Viper's Bugloss (Echium vulgare), Columbine (Aquilegia vulgaris), Speedwell (Veronica), Carnations (Dianthus) or comparable wild species, bumblebees won't take long to ask.