72 
THE FLORIST AND POMOLOGIST. 
[May, 
IMPATIENS ROYLEI AS A BEE 
PLANT. 
T may interest apiarians to know something 
of a plant, easily obtained and easily 
cultivated, that will supply their bees 
with a large quantity of honey at a 
season when honey-yielding flowers are get¬ 
ting scarce. This plant is no other than the 
Giant Balsam, Impatiens Uoylei of Walpers, 
better known under the previously occupied 
name of I. glandulifera, Boyle—not “ glandu- 
ligera,” as commonly written. It is an old 
inhabitant of our gardens, having been in¬ 
troduced from North India by Dr. Boyle about 
forty years ago ; and in neglected gardens or 
undisturbed ground it will reproduce itself 
year after year. Like the majority of its 
congeners, it is an annual, and a robust one 
it is, often growing to a height of 8 or 10 feet, 
or even higher, and having stout, fleshy, brittle, 
hollow stems. In the garden of the Horticul¬ 
tural Society at Chiswick, whither it was sent 
by Dr. Boyle in 1889, it attained upwards of 
12 feet in height by the end of August, although 
the seed was not sown before the end of May. 
This was probably under glass. A figure of it 
was published in the Botanical Register for 
1840 (t. 22), where Dr. Bindley says that it is 
one of the most beautiful plants that can be 
looked upon, flowering freely all the autumn. 
In the Botanical Magazine for 1843 is a figure 
(t. 4020) of a variety having flowers of a richer, 
darker purple. Its hardiness and beauty were 
then fully recognised. Sir 'William Hooker 
wrote:—“Notwithstanding the peculiarity of 
climate which prevails in the hill country of 
India, where this plant is a native, almost all 
seasons in this country seem to be favourable 
to its growth ; for, though a moist atmosphere 
singularly favours the rapid growth of this 
plant, yet dry as was the summer of last year, 
in my own garden it came to great perfection. 
And this summer there is a most abundant 
crop of self-sown plants, which only require to 
be thinned out, and thus an annual supply 
may, without difficulty, be kept up. In the 
earlier stage of the plant its coarse dark 
foliage is unpromising, but when the copious 
flowers come to perfection it will be seen that 
few annuals are better worthy of a place in 
every good-sized flower garden. The flowers 
are in the greatest perfection in autumn.” 
The species as limited in Hooker’s Flora of 
British India (i., 468) exhibits considerable 
variation in the form, size, and disposition of 
the leaves, as well as in the colour of the 
flowers. Thus I. Candida, Lindley ( Botanical 
Register, 1841, t. 20), is regarded as a variety ; 
this has narrow leaves thickly studded on the 
margin with crimson teeth, and nearly wholly 
white flowers. Another variety is the I. 
macrochila, Lindley ( Botanical Register, 1840, 
t. 8), which has brighter rosy-purple flowers, 
and the uppermost leaves at least are alternate. 
Without intermediate forms these would cer¬ 
tainly be regarded as species ; but whether we 
regard them as varieties or closely allied species 
is of little consequence. They all inhabit the 
same region in the North-Western Himalaya, 
from Nipal to Marri, at altitudes from 6,000— 
8,000 feet, and they all have the same robust 
habit, and probably, though by no means 
certainly, possess the same honej’-yielding 
properties. I. moschata, Edgeworth, is also 
referred to this species, though the author 
considered that it differed specifically in its 
musky odour, "habit, and more deeply serrated 
leaves. 
With regard to the value of Impatiens 
Boylei as a honey-yielding plant, we are in¬ 
debted to a report by Dr. Miinter, Director 
of the Botanic Garden of Greifswald, in the 
Garten-Zeitung [1882, 531J. It appears that 
it was exhibited at an exhibition of a society for 
the promotion of bee culture held at Potsdam, 
as a bee-feeding plant, and its qualities were 
so highly praised that a gentleman named Yon 
Behr determined to try it on the Baltic coast 
at Greifswald. The seed was sown in Sep¬ 
tember, 1881, in drills 1^ to 2 inches deep 
and about 4 inches apart, and as a matter of 
precaution a light covering was placed over 
the bed during the winter. In the spring, 
wdien the seedlings had reached the lieighf of 
about 2 inches, a few w r ere transplanted as 
near as possible to the bee-hives, at 2 to 3 feet 
apart. As early as the latter part of July the 
first flowers appeared, when the plants were 
4 to 5 feet high. Subsequently the plants 
grew most vigorously, so that by the beginning 
of September they were from 6 to 8 feet high, 
abundantly branched, and covered with flowers. 
On September 3 Dr. Miinter, accompanied by 
Dr. Goeze, went to Mr. Yon Behr’s garden for 
