Where The Bee Sucks, There Suck I

[kerravonsen]

Well, I just broke my diet in an unusual way: I went outside and ate some nectar. Silky-oak nectar, to be precise. Yum. Like dark liquid honey.

Not sure the best way to get it, though:
a) the stick your finger in the flower and lick off your finger method - tends to not get much, and it may drip off your finger
b) the wrap your hand around the flowers and lick your hand method - get more, but also get pollen, and it's messier
c) suck the flowers method - get even more, but you also get bits of the flowers in your mouth and you have to spit them out, your face may get a bit messy, and one may not be able to reach the flowers anyway

But one still gets a lot more nectar than with Nasturtiums or Honeysuckle.
I was surprised to see a crow feeding on them; usually it's smaller birds than that.

Comments

[thetisonline.livejournal.com]

This is either seriously weird, or seriously inspired!

Hasn't every Aussie secretly done this? I know I have (although not recently). What worries me is that the lorrikeets get drunk on the stuff once it's fermented a bit. LOL

[kerravonsen]

I wasn't aware that one could do this with silky-oak until recently; possibly because there weren't any silky-oaks nearby when I was a child, and now I have a lovely big one in my front yard.

[thetisonline.livejournal.com]

The silky oak trees near us were huge; so as kids we used to stick our tongues on gum flowers (not much nectar, and lots of pollen, but they have that intoxicating smell), and some of the ornamental grevillas.

[vilakins.livejournal.com]

We used to have flowers in our garden that my sister and I used to pick and suck the nectar out the bottom of. We called them honeysuckles, and they might have been. They were like little trumpets.

[kerravonsen]

That sounds like honeysuckle, yes. White and cream-coloured flowers, yes?

[vilakins.livejournal.com]

Yes! I always suspected though that we used the name because it was so appropriate. We only had them in the garden in Kawhia.

[mistraltoes.livejournal.com]

We had them, too.

[vilakins.livejournal.com]

We only had them in one garden, the place I lived from about 6-8. We were lucky in our experimentation, considering the number of poisonous flowers that grow around here, like oleander.

[jaxomsride.livejournal.com]

There is a plant named "silly-oak"!
It's never occured to me to try to suck nectar from a flower. I think I prefer my nectar processed mmm honey.

[persephone-kore.livejournal.com]

My grandmother taught me how to sip honeysuckle. It's different from honey; no real stickiness, just this one bright fleeting bit of sweet.

I actually never liked honey that much until after I started beekeeping.

[kerravonsen]

just this one bright fleeting bit of sweet.
What a lovely way of putting it.

[kerravonsen]

There is a plant named "silly-oak"!
No, silky-oak.

It's never occured to me to try to suck nectar from a flower. I think I prefer my nectar processed mmm honey.
Yes, but it's right outside the door, you don't have to buy it, and it's adventuresome.

[jaxomsride.livejournal.com]

Ah sorry I had only just woken up!
Evidently visual cortex was in "boot up" stage.

[vjezkova.livejournal.com]

Reading this, I had to smile. We suck nectar from purple clover in the meadow, then from false acacia blossoms, and also the lime-tree blossoms are very sweet whaen you lick them. Mmmm, I feel like tasting it again. But it will have to wait to Spring! :-)

[kerravonsen]

Sounds delicious.