What's this Northern Virginia weed bees love?

4663 Views 26 Replies 14 Participants Last post by jwcarlson, Jul 17, 2014

Phoebee

Discussion Starter · Jul 11, 2014

2

The pictures below are of a weed growing along the Prince William Parkway which the bees love. In fact, they look kinda like Dave's bees to me.

My wife is a Master Gardener, and this thing even stumps her. Some of you may suggest it is a snakeroot, but my wife thinks the leaves look more like a legume. She's not finding it in any of her identification guides.

If this stuff is native, it could be a good midsummer forage. The bees had the choice of red clover, white clover, crown vetch*, Queen Anne's lace*, long stem dandilions, honeysuckle, black eyed susans, fleabane, and common milkweed. They were going for this stuff and the one patch of milkweeds that were blooming. A single small plant of this stuff in a good patch would have 2-4 bees working it.

*(Yeah, lousy, but my bees like crown vetch and our bee supplier's bees like Queen Anne's lace, and they're the experts.)

Flower Flowering plant Plant Shrub Subshrub

Flower Plant Flowering plant Branch Tree

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1 - 20 of 27 Posts

Michael Palmer

· #2 · Jul 11, 2014

Looks a bit like White Sweet Clover, Melitotus alba

Phoebee

Discussion Starter · #3 · Jul 11, 2014

Looks more than a BIT like it, I'd say. I'll run this past the MG, but I think she'll agree. And now wonder they like it. Thanks.

PWRBA still tells glowing stories about the talk you gave for us.

mbwalton

· #4 · Jul 11, 2014

A form of Lespedeza?

BoonROTO

· #5 · Jul 11, 2014

Sweet White Clover for sure. That is the it food source around here at the moment but it is losing momentum fast.

Michael Bush

· #6 · Jul 11, 2014

White sweet clover.

jwcarlson

· #7 · Jul 11, 2014

How long will the sweet clover bloom last? We've been getting great rain and it sure seems almost "endless" right now. Between that and the chicory. And we've also got a couple of uncut alfalfa fields within foraging distance as well.

Phoebee

Discussion Starter · #8 · Jul 11, 2014

Ah, yeah, there was a lot of chicory blooming on the parkway as well. I've yet to see a honeybee on it, either in VA or WV. Do your bees work that?

All the popular clovers are introduced, but the sweet white and yellow clovers seem to get the tag "invasive" applied more heavily. Evidently they seed like crazy. I expect the MG will not introduce this type at the WV location, although she has planted other clovers. Any clover planted there is going to be heavily browsed by deer anyway.

A native forage started blooming about a week ago at our WV location: Agastache. Our honeybees took to it immediately. I'm thinking that for this time of the year, we'll do better by encouraging a dense patch of Viper's Bugloss, which does volunteer there but just not at an attractive density. And the deer don't touch Agastache or VB.

Michael Bush

· #9 · Jul 11, 2014

> Any clover planted there is going to be heavily browsed by deer anyway.

What do you have against the deer?

Phoebee

Discussion Starter · #10 · Jul 11, 2014

Michael Bush said:
> Any clover planted there is going to be heavily browsed by deer anyway.

What do you have against the deer?

Nothing, except they eat the bee forage the MG tries to plant. The clover we've planted is so picked over we've rarely seen a bee touch it.

We find deer to be quite tasty.

Michael Bush

· #11 · Jul 11, 2014

I have a lot of deer around, but no shortage of white and yellow and hubam sweet clover...

Phoebee

Discussion Starter · #12 · Jul 11, 2014

I've got a neighbor who feeds the deer generously, causing a huge concentration in an area already known to be red-zone overpopulated. Within half a mile of our property I'd guess there must be 80 regulars hanging around waiting for the next bag of cracked corn. The only plants in the understory of our woods are the things the deer can't eat. It looks almost like goats are penned up in our woods.

BoonROTO

· #13 · Jul 11, 2014

Sounds like you need some tactful educated and appreciative hunter to come harvest some table fare.

shannonswyatt

· #14 · Jul 11, 2014

The problem with deer in Virginia is they are suicidal. Carcasses are strewn all along the sides of roads. Many folks injured a year from hitting deer. Not enough hunters to keep the population in check anymore.

brooksbeefarm

· #15 · Jul 11, 2014

Deer in Mo. are getting over populated like in Virginia, as for sweet clover there are two types white and yellow and for some reason the bees like the white better. It is invasive but it is also bi annual, it's one of, if not the best flow in my area.

AstroBee

· #16 · Jul 11, 2014

Phoebee said:
already known to be red-zone overpopulated

No worries, the coyotes will be there soon to rescue your clover. Just keep an eye on Fido....

Scpossum

· #17 · Jul 11, 2014

AstroBee said:
No worries, the coyotes will be there soon to rescue your clover. Just keep an eye on Fido....

+1

shannonswyatt

· #18 · Jul 11, 2014

The Coyotes are here, just not in enough numbers to take out the deer. Some counties have (or had, I don't follow it closely) a bounty for Coyotes. My guess is they get mostly the young deer, but last year I saw one crossing the four lane that was the size of a German Shepherd. At first I thought it was a German Shepherd, I didn't know they could get that big.

winevines

· #19 · Jul 13, 2014

Phoebee said:
Looks more than a BIT like it, I'd say. I'll run this past the MG, but I think she'll agree. And now wonder they like it. Thanks.

PWRBA still tells glowing stories about the talk you gave for us.

Ask Louise... We've had tons of White Sweet Clover but I thought most of it dried up along 66. maybe recent rains have more blooming now along PW Parkway.
Other than this year, the best honey year I've had in the past is the year of the big budget cuts when VDOT stopped mowing the roadsides. Bring back Lady Bird Johnson!

tonyp

· #20 · Jul 13, 2014

We have a lot of that plant starting to pop up everywhere around here. Never seen it before till this year. I wondered where it came from. It 's growing along the ditches on the side of the road all over Clermont county. I wondered if the Ohio dot or someone drove around and threw out seed or it's just spreading on its own.

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