Bee's-eye view

White dead-nettle, Lamium album, is a common plant of all sorts of habitats, especially disturbed 'waste' ground. It is a fantastic source of nectar and pollen early in the year for bumblebees and goes on to flower for most of the year. It is edible and widely used in herbal medicine. A distillation of the flowers is supposed "to make the heart merry, to make a good colour in the face, and to make the vital spirits more fresh and lively". All this happened to me this afternoon...just watching the bees delighting in the flowers between rain showers.