Earliest flowering pollinators?

[Root66]

I grew marigolds, borage, sunflowers, lupins and nasturtiums, with great success.

I am looking for something to flower earlier, to attract the bees at the right time, it seemed these flowered quite late. Do I just try to start these off earlier under cloches or can you recommend other flowers?

Thank you

[veggiechicken]

Crocuses, the little purple ones ?sp Tommasiana - flower in Jan/Feb here. Not all the bees are up and about then as it can be a bit cold for them.
Ivy flowers are the classic food for bees in winter.

[Thelma Sanders]

Grow a Mahonia the early wakening Bumble bees love the flowers in late winter/early Spring and wallflowers are good as well I've got some in tubs by the front door

[mothhawk]

Pulmonaria too. And snowdrops and bluebells. Grape hyacinths, primroses, pulsatilla (pasque flower) are all good, and early spring flowering. Hellebores (lent rose) too. Winter flowering honeysuckle is a great favorite here in February when the bumbles start to wake up on mild days.

When exactly do you want to attract pollinators?

It's probably a good idea to provide as much food for the bees as possible all the time, then they will get into the routine of always checking your garden because they know there will be food there.

Balance is involved too. For example if you have loads of foxgloves flowering, the big bumbles will pretty much ignore the comparatively paltry bean flowers, as it's much easier to get pollen in large quantities from the foxgloves.

[jackarmy]

Hmmmmmmm,wires crossed ?

My guess is Root is not just intent on feeding the bees , more like attracting the bees so that they pollinate his veg and eddible stuff at the earliest possible time ? .

As John Lyndon said ( in hs best band ) " I could be wrong , i could be right"

[Jungle Jane]

My flowering currant shrub attracts bees earlier than my fruit & veg flowers. I usually start off French marigold seeds etc in March. The other day I was reading about f1 hybrid seeds & bees/pollinators not being interested in them;
"Hybrid plants with large, showy flowers often have less (or no) pollen than native plants. Flowers bred for size, colour, and disease resistance, are sometimes sterile and therefore of no use to pollinators"
Plant a Bee Attracting Garden - BC Farms & Food

(My geranium F2 were totally bug free,never saw a bee or anything near them but also nothing has wanted to eat them,even slugs & snails,I wonder what they do to make the seed pest resistant like that,or do geraniums just taste bad maybe?)

[Root66]

Hmmmmmmm,wires crossed ?

My guess is Root is not just intent on feeding the bees , more like attracting the bees so that they pollinate his veg and eddible stuff at the earliest possible time ? .

As John Lyndon said ( in hs best band ) " I could be wrong , i could be right"

Yes jackarmy. Sorry for the confusion, it's my fault.

Although i'm more than happy to feed the bees early, my question was more about having some flowers out when my veg needs pollinating. It seemed that most of my flowers produced later than I was hoping/expecting. It's possible i just need to sow them earlier or encourage them with a cloche or something.

I think mothhawk makes two great points in attracting bees all year around, so they regularly visit or live on my plot. Also to not overload with flowers and so the bees miss the veggie ones.

@junglejane Thanks for the information regarding hybrids. I did see bees around all the flowers I grew so that was encouraging, i just wanted to see that a month or more earlier.

Thanks everyone for your help and suggestions