124 B.C. Entomological Societ.v. 



NATIVE FLOWERS FOR BEES. 



By J. Davidson, F.L.S., F.B.S.E., Botanist in Charge of the Herbarium 

 AND Botanical Gardens, University of B.C. 



Numerous requests from residents in various parts of the Province for 

 assistance in the identification of " honey-yielding " plants, and for informa- 

 tion regarding the native flora of regions where settlers proposed to 

 establish apiaries, prompted me to select " Native Flowers for Bees " as a 

 subject for discussion before this Society, in response to the request of the 

 Secretary. 



As the bee-keeping industry is a comparatively new one in this 

 Province, bee-keepers here have to depend largely on the experience of 

 apiarists in other Provinces or in the United States, and British Columbia 

 apiarists are finding many interesting problems, due largely to the fact 

 that our climatic conditions and native flora are quite dilTerent from those 

 of the Eastern Provinces and for most of the States in America. Further, 

 in British Columbia we have such a variety of habitats, from the moist 

 Coast area with luxuriant vegetation to the arid Interior with an almost 

 desert flora, and again to the moist regions of the Interior and the foot-hills 

 of the Rockies, in all of which the soil, the rainfall, the growing season, 

 the extremes of temperature, and the resultant effect of these on the flora 

 show corresponding dift'erences which make it necessary for the prospective 

 apiarist to study local conditions and be guided by his observations. 



The relationship between the local flora and the success or failure of 

 apiarist cannot be disputed. You can have no more bees than the flora will 

 support; apart from insect parasites, the flora is the limiting factor. Bees, 

 being the only insects which feed their offspring with pollen, are wholly 

 dependent upon flowers for their own food and that of their offspring. 



One need not here enter into the discussion of the relationship between 

 the habits of bees and the structure of flowers, further than to mention that 

 without our native bees this Province would be minus many of our showy 

 wild flowers, for as pollinating agents the bees far surpass all other insects 

 in importance. So dependent are many flowers on the visits of bees that 

 in their absence they fail to produce seed, as is well known in the case of 

 red clover, salvia, larkspur, and some orchids. You probably know that 

 when the farmers of New Zealand first grew red clover it failed to produce 

 seed because there were no bumble-bees in New Zealand, and it was not 

 until several species of these were introduced from Great Britain that the 

 raising of clover-seed became commercially profitable. The bee-keeper is 

 similarly indebted to many species of wild or native bees for the abundance 

 of flowers which he depends upon to replenish his apiary from year to 

 year. 



About fifteen years ago Lord Avebury advanced a theory that blue 

 flowers were mostly favoured by bees, and numerous examples given made 

 the theory seem very plausible. It has since been shown that structure, 

 and perhaps odour, is of greater importance than colour, because different 

 coloured varieties of asters, zinnias, and centaureas are visited indiscrimi- 



