Plants for bees - Pineapple Sage

I've been making a lot of manuka seedlings and cuttings and trees lately, for the beebiz. But when the manuka is not flowering, the bees need food still. So I think that pineapple sage and rosemary might fill the gap. Pineapple sage in particular seems to flower for months on end, from about autumn till spring, so perfect to fill the gap. And it is super easy to propagate from cuttings. And grows like crazy.

Here are some cuttings that I made in autumn, that I have just potted up into bigger pots, as the space for them to be planted is not ready yet.

And here is one of the same batch of cuttings, that I have planted along side my retaining wall a few months ago. So, by putting it in the ground, it is about 5 times as big as the ones that remained in pots. And will keep growing to be about 1 to 1 1/2 metres high I expect.

You can cut these back quite vigorously when they start to get in the way, they seem quite indestructible. The original plant that all these have come from was given to me by a work friend probably 25 years ago. And it has been dug up, moved around, bulldozed, neglected. As long as I just keep a bit of the roots, off it goes again. And, as if all that is not enough, its a herb, of the sage family, with a pineapply flavour (obviously!). Although I haven't actually found a good use for a pineapply herb. But should you require that, this is your plant. It does smell lovely to brush against.

A busy bee

A busy bee bottom, foraging in the snapdragons

Potting up Thyme Cuttings

Those lovely vigorous thyme cuttings were starting to grow quite quickly, but I didn't think they were big enough for putting straight into the stone garden yet. Although I was concerned the roots would all start to inter-tangle. So I have potted them up into little pots. I'll let them get a bit bigger, then plant out.

And while I was doing that, some of the new crop of pineapple sage were ready to move up into pots too. This growing something from nothing could become quite addictive.

Trees for Bees

It was a big potting weekend, moving some of the manuka trees on into bigger pots. Here is some of what I started with

 I used 2 sizes of new bags, some of the seedlings had become quite big. Although when I had worked down to the smaller ones, they were not so desperately needing moving on up, as their roots were not filling the old bags yet.

And here they all are, repotted. Still got quite a few left on the table, but it is only half covered now, and all the chairs are free.

Pineapple Sage Cuttings

 I needed to trim the pineapple sage, so I turned the bits all into cuttings.  These should root really well, pineapple sage seems indestructible.  Assuming it survives my cats, who are behaving as though it is catnip, not a sage.  I've had to stick the cuttings back in several times, and they are getting all furry now. Its also a good plant for late autumn flowering for bees searching for food.  I thought this might go along under the retaining wall, around other things - mass planting style.