A recent trip to the Mendocino Coast Botanical Gardens, Fort Bragg, yielded spectacular views of the ocean, but something else also proved spectacular--the honey bees and bumble bees foraging on borage.

Borage (Borago officinalis) is a blue starflower with distinguishing black anthers, coupled with hairy, bristly stems and leaves. Borage is often used as a vegetable or herb in culinary dishes, such as salads and soups. It's also used to garnish a cocktail,  flavor hot tea and to fill pasta ravioli.

Some folks swear by its medicinal purposes--its anti-inflammatory properties reportedly help you recover from a respiratory infection, or alleviate mild depression.

Your great-grandmother may have embroidered the likeness of a borage on her pillowcases or painted it on canvas or arranged the colorful flowers in a vase.

If you stroll through the Mendocino Coast Botanical Gardens, you'll see borage lining one side of a traditional vegetable plot. 

Honey bees and bumble bees can't get enough it.

Neither can photographers.