8-12 Hives. Nothing else available at all, from mid-July until close to Sept
(when goldenrod starts thinking about blooming).  Would like pure buckwheat
flavor (and that nice nearly black color).  Irrigation is a fact of life
these days, even when we aren't supposed to have to water. August is not
traditionally our driest month, but last year we had zero rain the entire
month (which contributed to death of even mature tulip poplar trees and
quite a few locust). Our main flow is from mid-April to about July 1st (give
or take a week or so), with clover and tulip poplar the main crop flows (so,
my usual honey is a light to red color, depending on the year).  As to
available land - from 1/4 acre garden (most of it in use, however) to a
couple of acres in the orchard to 10 or so that could be used (with more
work, mostly mixed grass and red clover).  The rest is hardwood forest with
a good number of poplar trees.  Since our idiot neighbors have started
logging again (on extremely steep land), we don't want to lose any more of
them in our area.

I've experimented with anise hyssop and mountain mint, mainly to see how
attractive they are and when they bloom.  The bees like the mountain mint,
which blooms in July, but ignore the hyssop (but, I now have a very large
number of butterflies, as they love it, as well as solitary bees,
hummingbird bees (snowberry clearwing moth), etc). The honey bees ignore it,
despite its reputation. Echinacea, said to be attractive to butterflies, is
well liked by the honey bees; however, it can be somewhat expensive to put
in an acre of it (although a good potential return in a few years, if kept
weed free).  All three of these, however, would need no irrigation after the
first year and are perennial.

-----Original Message-----
From: Hensler

> I'm thinking of planting as a cover crop and late honey source (timing for
> late august).  How large an area would be needed to be useful?

It would depend on how many hives you are using, what else is available for
them to work during that time and how dominate you want the buckwheat flavor
to be, how much land you have available for planting, and if you will need
to irrigate the crop during Aug. or not.