Why not boost your bee-friendly plant stock this year?

This is one of the ideas from the new campaign, Bee Creative In The Garden!, a new campaign launched by the RHS in collaboration with The Wildlife Trusts to urge gardeners to help protect bees.

Boosting your bee-friendly plants means growing more flowers, shrubs and trees that provide nectar and pollen as food for bees and other pollinators throughout the year.

For example primroses and crocuses in spring, lavenders, meadow cranesbill and ox-eye daisies in summer, ivy and hebes in autumn and mahonia and cyclamen in winter.

As a general guide, bees see purple and blue better than other colours and will use their senses to find other colours such as white apple blossom.

Different bee species prefer different flower shapes, so aim for a range from tubular-shaped flowers like snapdragons and wallflowers, to open-headed flowers like yarrow and verbena.

The experts also advise to leave patches of land to grow wild with plants like stinging nettles and dandelions to provide other food sources (such as leaves for caterpillars) and breeding places for butterflies and moths.

Native flowering plants in grass areas, field corners, verges and specially sown flower-rich habitats support the greatest diversity of insect pollinators by providing nectar and pollen resources, places to nest or breed, and leaves for caterpillars.

Avoid disturbing or destroying nesting or hibernating insects in places like grass margins, bare soil, hedgerows, trees, dead wood or walls. Pollinators need to nest in safety so that they and the next generation can survive winter, to start again in the following spring.

And dig a garden pond to act as a drinking spot and help biodiversity. Ponds are a magnet for beneficial insects and other wildlife.

If you find a tired bumblebee, mix sugar with water, place on a teaspoon and leave it in front of the bee, to act as a quick energy supplement.