Pollinator Friendly

Plants whose bloom feeds bees and other pollinators, with early and late bloom counting for extra. Everything here scored 6 or higher out of 10.

More about planting for bees

American linden scored highest, 9/10. It's the latest-blooming tree we know of in Missoula, flowering into late July when bees need it. Chokecherry, golden currant and hawthorn scored 8/10. Bees love chokecherry flowers, and golden currant puts out fragrant yellow flowers in spring.

To keep something in bloom through the season, start with peach leaf willow, whose early catkins feed bees. Add golden currant and native American plum for spring, rugose rose for early summer, and finish with linden. Willows also host hundreds of moth and butterfly species.

Most of these feed you or your soil too. Chokecherry scored 9/10 for jams and jellies, and sand cherry and native American plum 8/10. Comfrey scored 9/10 for soil building, since you chop its big leaves and drop them around your trees. Jerusalem artichoke is a perennial vegetable hardy to zone 2. Plants that do double duty for birds are under feeds wildlife.

Nearly everything here is hardy to zone 2, and Adam's and John's elderberries and purple lilac are rated through zone 3. A lot of these are also native plants. Hawthorn needs cross-pollination, native American plum needs two genotypes and peach leaf willow has male and female plants, so plant more than one. The Plant Finder can help you narrow it down.

Questions we get

What trees bloom late for bees?

American linden flowers into late July in Missoula, later than any other tree we know of here. It scored 9/10 for pollinators.

What shrubs are good for bees in Montana?

Chokecherry, golden currant and hawthorn scored 8/10 for pollinators, and all three are hardy to zone 2.

What's the difference between a pollinator and a pollenizer?

Pollinators are the bees, moths and other insects that carry pollen. A pollenizer is a plant that supplies pollen to another variety so it can set fruit.

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