Dear Readers, it might be the end of summer, but the sunflowers at East Finchley tube station are making sure that there’s a last blast of sunshine. Even after a torrential downpour on Thursday they were attractive the bees, and I’ve no doubt that, given half a chance, the birds would be after the seedheads as well.

On this particular flower, there was a common carder bumblebee at the seven o’clock position, and a honeybee at one o’clock, still collecting pollen for the hive. I’ve mentioned before that common carders are some of the last bumblebees on the wing in the autumn – you might see the occasional queen buff-tailed/white-tailed bumblebee foraging before winter hibernation, but generally most of them are now either dead or already hibernating. If you have any ivy near you, keep an eye open for ivy bees, who should just about be hatching from their underground nests.

Ivy bee

Back to the common carder bumblebee, though – different bumblebee species are able to access different food, because they have tongues of varying length. The common carder is a long-tongued species, which means it can access the nectar in flowers which have a long ‘neck’. In sunflowers, each of the florets in the middle is actually a separate flower, so there’s plenty for the bees to feed on. In fact, the way that the florets are arranged is the most mathematically efficient way to pack the seeds into the seed head. They form a series of interconnecting spirals which are successive Fibonacci numbers, and at this point my brain explodes, so any mathematicians out there please pop elucidation in the comments!

Anyhow, I would like to say thank you to the volunteer East Finchley Gardeners who keep the pots on the station platforms full of sunshine. It certainly made my day!