Our Species on the Edge Youth Panel representative for the North Coast, Lucas, went wild with wildflower seed last April and we are delighted that he very quickly saw some pretty remarkable results from his efforts!
“In April of this year, we had some work going on around the farm, and ended up with an area of bare ground. Ever the optimists, we just chucked some random wildflower seeds onto it and hoped for the best.
It was obviously the right decision! By June we had a nice little area filled with flowers of borage, poppies, crimson clover, but predominantly Purple tansy (Phacelia tanacetifolia).
This was lovely on its own, and we were happy with the number of bees, hoverflies, and moths it was pulling in, however we were totally taken off guard by the sudden appearance of Great yellow bumblebees. They’ve been spotted in the area before, but in the 10 or so years I’ve been looking, I had never seen one.
After a few days spent sitting and watching these beautiful big bees, it was even better to find out that they were coming back consistently, one or two every half hour or so, in among the common carders, moss carders, buff tails, white tails, and the occasional garden bumblebee. Worker bees were then joined by some queens and males later on in the year – there must have been a Great yellow bumblebee colony somewhere nearby.”
Read more on North Sutherland Wildlife Group’s blog: Waste ground + Wildflower seeds = Great Yellow Bumblebees!
