Our local farmer is growing echium this year, the first time it has been grown in the area.
It looks lovely, a bright blue flower, with some white flowers mixed in.
It is in the borage family and we are looking forward to seeing what the honey is like.
Interestingly the pollen is very dark, almost black. Bees collect pollen and use it as the basis of the carbohydrate food they feed to larvae as they develop into fully formed bees. They carry it in ‘pollen sacks’, in reality a group of hairs on the back of their legs used to stick lumps of pollen to.
The pictures below show yellow oil seed rape pollen and the dark echium pollen.
We have a couple of very strong colonies this year and have added some empty supers, to make sure that they have pure echium honey as it comes in.
Come back in a few weeks, when we have collected the honey, to hear what it is like and perhaps try some yourself.