Autumn Blooming Ryan Gainey Chrysanthemums

 

Check out the amazing orange colored pollen!  Cold and windy weather confined the bees, followed by this sunny 47°F morning.  Ryan Gainey Chrysanthemums provided much needed autumn nectar and pollen - just in time as goldenrod flowers have finished blooming.

Have you seen my pollen basket?

 

Amazing orange colored pollen! These photos zoomed and cropped seem as vivid as the live experience. I don't know the chrysanthemum type, but this large flower size is not typical of chrysanthemums for sale.  

autumn blooming chrysanthemum

 

I read Seeley's Following the Wild Bees and became keenly interested in beelining.  I ordered a beelining box from BetterBee and have since sealed the wood with water-based polyurethane. Without success I have been searching for honey bees on wild goldenrod flowers for beelining. Instead I found honey bees on Ryan Gainey Chrysanthemums.   You might say my beelining problem is solved, but I don't want to crush the neighbor's flower heads with the beelining box.  So, I'll wait and wait some more for honey bees to discover wild goldenrod flowers.

kri-ˈsan(t)-thə-məm - unlikely food source

Following a week of wet, cold and windy weather confining the bees, two sunny days, the bees are active starting at 48 °F.   Where are the bees going?  It's almost too late for golden rod.   Today at noon, walking past a south facing garden with a large patch of flowers, I discovered honey bees and native pollinators visiting chrysanthemum flowers.   I can barely pronounce kri-ˈsan(t)-thə-məm, let alone spell this successfully.

An unlikely food source, Xerces Society resources don't include chrysanthemum in their list of pollinator friendly plants!