On the sunny side of our cabin, we have hundreds of cone flowers (Echinacea), with a few black-eyed Susans (Rudbeckia) and rampant oregano (Origanum vulgare). The cone flowers are very congenial. They sleep until the hyacinths and irises have had their showtime, then grow tall and burst into flower. Their blooms are long-lived. The bees go mad for them.
I’m not sure about this type of bee. They gather here by the dozens. I don’t think they are honeybees. Maybe bumble bees?
The butterflies love them too. We have quite a few flowers on our property, but the monarchs seem to love the coneflowers best.
If I were an ardent herbalist, I might be digging up the echinacea roots in the fall to process into a medicinal remedy. But the nostrums have little scientific backing. And it does seem like a sin to kill a coneflower.
