When was the last time you were able to admire a bumblebee in your garden? It is 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.
How do I successfully attract bumblebees to my garden?
To successfully attract bumblebees, avoid chemicals, plant native wild perennials, maintain natural nesting places and build nesting aids. Bee pastures and traditional plants such as broad beans, columbine or lavender are also important.
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 successfully attract bumblebees 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 provide hungry bumblebees with an abundance of nectar and pollen. The following overview provides important details on how to properly attract bumblebees:
- Cure plant diseases 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 your own organic plant fertilizer
- Sowing bee pastures and planting plants for bumblebees
Food plants for bumblebees
Bumblebees are crazy about native wildflowers, herbs and flowering trees. If you want to attract bumblebees permanently, these traditional plants should not be missing in the garden:
| Forage plants bumblebees | Botanical name | Location recommendation |
|---|---|---|
| Faba bean | Vicia faba | Vegetable patch |
| Common Columbine | Aquilegia vulgaris | Flower bed, balcony |
| Blackberry, raspberry | Rubus ssp. | Orchard |
| Sedums | Sedum | Drywall |
| mullein | Verbascum | Perennial bed |
| Lavender | Lavendula | Rock Garden |
| Blackthorn | Prunus spinosa | hedge, fencing |
| Hawthorn | Crataegus | Cottage Garden |
| Peach | Vicia | Facade greening |
Top tip 2: Preserve natural nesting sites
Often there is still ice and snow when bumblebee queens start looking for a suitable location for their little colony. Hobby gardens that can provide natural nesting places are now clearly ahead. These include tree hollows, abandoned mouse nests in the ground, quarry stone walls, mixed flower hedges, dry stone walls and dead wood hedges. By avoiding intensive tillage, building seamless garden walls made of natural stone and piling up dead wood to form a hedge, you can successfully attract bumblebees into your green realm.
Top tip 3: Build nesting aids for bumblebees
Is there a lack of natural nesting places in the garden? Then give nature a helping hand and build artificial nesting aids to attract bumblebees looking for somewhere to live. Get inspired by the following ideas:
- Create earth nesting holes (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 protected from rain
- Hang up bird nesting aids and convert them into bumblebee nesting boxes (instructions on wildbienen.de)
If you're a beginner and are trying to get bumblebees to visit your garden, you're on the safe side with ready-made bumblebee nesting boxes (€49.00 on Amazon). A wide range of proven models is available from specialist retailers. In order to reliably attract bumblebees, self-made or purchased nesting aids must be ready for use by March 1st at the latest.
Tip
As a balcony gardener, you can easily attract bumblebees with a small, bee-friendly garden. If you plant a box or pot with viper's head (Echium vulgare), columbine (Aquilegia vulgaris), speedwell (Veronica), carnations (Dianthus) or similar wild species, bumblebees won't take long to ask.
