Viper's bugloss (Echium Vulgare) as a honey plant

I am a beekeeper in New Brunswick Canada and am considering seeding some Viper's bugloss (Echium Vulgare) in specific baron or rocky areas on our property. Although in some states this plant is considered very invasive it is not listed that way in New Brunswick and where we have a very short season and harsh climate I am looking for plants that will be good for bees and survive. I have heard from some sources that Viper's bugloss is a very good honey plant once established and produces excellent honey. However I have also read that there has been pyrrolizidine alkaloids found in the honey and/or pollen which apparently is bad for humans. The following site takes you to information on this http://www.fzi.uni-freiburg.de/pdf/44_1.pdf . Does anybody know whether the honey from this plant is really bad for humans or whether this is something to be concerned about? Thank you for any help.

Stephen,

Echium Vulgare is something that I am trying this year in Nova Scotia. I have also posted on the boards about it and have gotten very little feedback as well. I have heard of some people knowing the flower in New Zealand, but not many in the US or Canada - even though it is a ditch flower in most of the continent. The Toronto area has a fair amount of it. We are supposed to have it here as well but I have not seen it myself.

Thanks for the paper. Interesting stuff, and good to know, as E. Vulgare is supposed to produce huge amounts of pollen. The paper's findings could be especially important if you are selling pollen.

Keep in mind also that it is a biennial - so it won't flower until year two.

Adam


Adam

pyrrolizidine alkaloids are present in a lot of plants - including borage.

Hi Stephen.

I have a good flow of bugloss/blue thistle and it makes beautiful, water-white honey. It grows in poor, rocky soil and the long tap root means it always has moisture, even in dry summers. For me that bloom is most of the month on June, far stronger than the borage flow.

I didn't have to seed to get this stuff, in fact I used to try to get rid of it. After watching the bees make beautiful comb honey from it I decided to get out of the way.

I've since eaten many pounds of bugloss honey and I can say it's only been good to me.

Nicole

I've looked into this more and I don't get it. Pyrrolizidine alkaloids supposedly can cause liver damage if you ingest too much of it.

It seems like the biggest concentration of honey from this plant comes from New Zealand. However, New Zealand also has some of the lowest rates of liver-related health problems in the world.

It seems like adverse effects would be apparent in areas where a lot of it is made and consumed...

Adam

Hi Adam,

Thank you for the information. It sounds to me like we really have nothing to worry about at least if are just interested in harvesting honey. Having said this, we probably should not plant acres and acres of it...

Stephen

Bump here is a link for this flower.

http://www.themelissagarden.com/TMG_Vetaley031608.htm

I'm going to fill my whole backyard with this plant along with lavender, buckwheat. Maybe just all echium vulgare.

I planted about a 1/2 acre of purple tansy and 1/2 of borage. The borage bloomed all summer till hard frost and got worked hard. The purple tansy was alot shorter span around 5 weeks but the bees loved it and worked it till they browned out.

was just wondering if anyone has planted vipers bug loss in a field and how much honey was harvested per acre.

Quote:

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Originally Posted by ImaNewBeeToThis

Bump here is a link for this flower.

http://www.themelissagarden.com/TMG_Vetaley031608.htm

I'm going to fill my whole backyard with this plant along with lavender, buckwheat. Maybe just all echium vulgare.

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Well this is very interesting. Having determined that I still have viable colonies after winter (well, it's not really over, but getting there) I have been planning out this year's bee pasture experiments and just yesterday was searching for a supply of echium seed - it's not easily found, certainly not in any sort of bulk amount, although I did find one source:
https://www.horizonherbs.com/pilot.asp

$2.95 for 100 seeds.

I thought I might get a few packs. It does grow around here. I marked down a few decent plants along highway 102 just west of Fredericton last summer but the highways people shredded them before I could get to collect any seeds.

Not long ago I was in Australia where a similar echium has become invasive of pastures on a grand scale, whole hillsides of blue, incredible for bees, but hated by pastoralists as browsing livestock will not eat it.

It should be possible to collect and develop a reasonable seed supply over a few years?

Last summer I grew anise hyssop and from one pack saved a pound jar full of seed. Hope it will germinate!

Rob

I would like to hear from anyone that has had success with vipers and what you can expect with nectar flow. My goal is to plant 320 acres and run my 800 hives on it with 250 pound average. Average around here is around 175.

Further to the question about the potentially troublesome alkaloids in echium pollen, nectar and honey, this advisory comes from the Aus/NZ food standards people, where they have whole paddocks miles wide full of echium. Down there it's commonly known as "Paterson's Curse" for ruining horse pastures.

Paterson's Curse/Salvation Jane honey
(Last updated October 2011)

Some types of honey contain high levels of naturally occurring plant toxins, known as pyrrolizidine alkaloids, which may cause adverse health effects.

The toxins may get into the honey when bees forage on the flowers of Paterson’s Curse, also known as Salvation Jane.

FSANZ has established a safe level of intake for these alkaloids of one microgram per kilogram bodyweight per day based on the known toxicity in humans.

For most people who eat small amounts of honey, the levels of pyrrolizidine alkaloids would be well below the tolerable daily intake and not a cause for concern.

But it’s recommended anyone who eats more than two tablespoons of honey a day doesn’t eat Paterson’s Curse honey exclusively.

Pure Paterson’s Curse honey is relatively uncommon and is usually bought from specialty markets and online distributors. Most honey processors blend their Paterson’s Curse honey with other honey to reduce the pyrrolizidine alkaloids to a safe level.

Source:
http://www.foodstandards.gov.au/scie...salvat5335.cfm

Here in Canada where E. vulgare is native I think it would be hard to establish major stands of it, even if we wanted to. There will be natural factors working against that. These are absent in Australia, so it runs amok. I would see echium as a potentially useful and interesting plant to boost around the beeyards but I doubt we'd have to worry too much about the alkaloids.

Rob

For more and more specific information:
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Echium

The plant Patterson's Curse is indeed an Echium, but is not E. vulgare but E. plantagineum. The Echium sold as garden plants (Viper's Bugloss) are mostly E. vulgare hybrids, most quite pretty and beloved of honeybees.

In talking about deliberate bee forage plantings in our local bee club, we have been mindful of the recent studies on bee health, which advocate multiple pollen sources for bees, as they all have different nutritional profiles, and the more diverse their pollen sources, the healthier the bees are. So by all means plant Echium, but plant lots of other things too.

One good page to read:
http://www.themelissagarden.com/plants.html

That page advocates a top five pick of plants designed to offer long season high nutrition for bees: Echium, borage, Melissa (lemon balm), tansy, goldenrod. Personally I am not too fond of goldenrod honey, so would perhaps plant mustard instead. West Coast Seeds has a nice bee friendly mix in their Go Go Sprouting blend..."A delightful sprouting mix of certified organic alfalfa, red clover, azuki beans, mustard, and fenugreek."

I have found bees in my garden love heather (early bloom), Joe Pye Weed (late bloom), cosmos, tansy (variety "Jackpot" is a nice garden plant), Lovage, catmint (not catnip, but catmint, long season of bloom), Carypoteris (Bluebeard, a pretty shrub, very late blooming).

Definitely the bees vote in drives for Joe Pye Weed. Last summer I saw four different types of bees on it at once. I collected seed and will be trying to propagate it this coming season.

Rob

Rob, Joe Pye Weed is one of my most favourite plants in the garden. Our clump is about 5 years old, grows around 6-7' high and 5' wide, puts out huge flower heads that bloom for weeks, and you are right, every pollinator you can think of goes for them. Like fennel, they attract all kinds of insects to the banquet. Joe Pye Weed would be fabulous planted along the back of a vista.