Perfume and Pollination 1 - The Privet

 

Border Privet, Ligustrum obtusifolium

During the month of June privet shrubs come into flower at Halibut Point. You're likely to notice their fragrance before you even see the little ivory blossoms. Strong fragrance and white petals is a combination often employed by plants that attract night-flying pollinators such as moths, which are reputed to visit privets in the dark. That attribute I have not personally verified by camera in the nocturnal forests of our State Park. As in so many other dimensions I borrow freely from the science of naturalists to deepen the pleasure of what I can see before my eyes.

Halictid bee on privet blossom

Privet shrubs sponsor a champion pollination program, which produces such masses of berries that privet progeny rival bittersweet at the top of the regional invasive plant list. I have gazed (during daylight)  at thousands of privet shrubs blooming this month in the Park. Oddly, only bees have responded to their nectar-for-pollination invitation. It's as though the invitation is scented "Only bees need apply." Myriad other insect types fly, hop, or crawl right on by without stopping.

Leafcutter bee

What leads to such a narrowed clientele? I wondered if it had something to do with the tubular shape of the flowers that puts the reward deep within, where only long-tongued partners could reach it as they covered themselves with pollen during the forage. But the bees observably concentrate their attention at the entrance rather than the recesses of the blossom.

Bicolored striped-sweat bee

It seems more likely that the selective message lies within the realm of smell, where privets are not at all shy. They saturate the air with a tropical muskiness that to my nose suggests honey and vanilla. One blogging commentator opines that "there is a class of fragrance that lies somewhere between perfume and scent" and that privet's "sweet, pungent scent has been likened to the scent of an animal." Human reaction to privet fragrance is quite partisan, perhaps parallel to responses in the insect world.

Bumblebee approaching privet flowers

When Hampton Sun, a producer of luxury cosmetic products, launched its Privet Bloom brand in 2007 a reviewer ranted that it "really should be advertised as a home fragrance rather than a personal one....it smells most like a big duffel bag used as a beach bag [that] was left by a blooming privet hedge, next to a bag of ripe plums. It is choke full of toiletries and makeup and the scents of powders and lipsticks are raging inside the bag under the sun."

Honeybee

Bee that as it may, privet flowers are highly popular with industrious apiary workers intent on bringing rich nourishment back to the hive.

Eastern Tiger Swallowtail on privet in bloom

Their allure to a Swallowtail butterfly in a past season provided my only recorded sighting of a non-apiary visitor to privet flowers. This souvenir image fully completes the richness if not the rarity of that moment.