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Garden Advice

It’s National Pollinator Week!

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National Pollinator Week was started by the Pollinator Partnership and approved and designated by the U.S. Senate 15 years ago. It’s a celebration of pollinators and what they do for us. It’s also a time to raise awareness about pollinators and their declining populations. If you love nature, gardening, and pollinators, it’s a wonderful week to get involved.

Butterfly on flower (pollinator week)Fun Facts About Pollinators

  • There are about 350,000 species of pollinators worldwide. These species include birds, butterflies, bees, flies, bats, moths, beetles, wasps, small mammals, and even lizards!
  • Native pollinators, especially bees, are estimated to contribute $3 billion to the value of crop pollination in the U.S..
  • The southeastern blueberry bee is an excellent example of the importance of native pollinators. In her few weeks as an adult, a single female bee visits about 50,000 blueberry flowers, resulting in over 6,000 marketable blueberries worth about $75.
  • There are approximately 4,000 native bee species in the United States, 10% of which have not been named or described.
  • About 20%-45% of native bees are pollen specialists, meaning they use only pollen from one plant species (or genus). They often do a better job with these plants than non-specialized species. 
  • Most plants, more than 70 percent of species, depend on pollinators for reproduction.
  • Pollinator decline has been reported on every continent except Antarctica.
  • Estimates showed that wild bees declined 23 percent across the United States between 2008 and 2013. 
  • There are several factors causing pollinator decline, including diseases and pathogens, conversion of natural habitats to row crops, pesticide use, and habitat loss and fragmentation.

Identifying Pollinators

From moths to bumblees, identifying specific species of polliantors, particularly insects, can be challenging. Today, there are many apps that can help along with some quality guidebooks like Common Bees of Eastern North America by Olivia J. Messinger Carril and Joseph S. Wilson. 

Another great resource is iNaturalist, a joint initiative of the California Academy of Sciences and the National Geographic Society that allows you to share observations and get confirmed identifications from other naturalists.

2023 National Pollinator Week

The 2023 National Pollinator Week is focused on the connection between pollinator decline and climate change. They now face increased disease pressure, food source and habitat loss, rising temperatures, and more frequent natural disasters, all of which have impacted their ability to survive.

Bee on Jewels of Opar (pollinator week)How Do I Get Involved with Pollinator Week?

  • Find Pollinator Week activities in your area or add your own activities to the map and invite others to join in. 
  • Build an insect hotel or native bee house. 
  • Plan or start a pollinator garden.
  • Share information about pollinators on social media.
  • Host a native plant and seed sale or exchange. 
  • Watch or screen a pollinator documentary. 
  • Eliminate pesticide usage in your garden. 
  • Write to local, state, or federal officials and encourage them to take climate change and the plight of pollinators seriously.
  • Turn more of your lawn into garden or native plantings. 

Ideally, we think about pollinators and do right by them every day. However, Pollinator Week is a good time to reflect on our current practices and encourage others to do so as well. It can be as simple as talking about pollinators with your family and friends or sharing some native seeds with a neighbor, or as involved as campaigning for systematic changes in your state or community. 

Garden Advice

A Beginners Guide to Pollination

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Gardeners often talk about the importance of bees and butterflies. While these pollinators are important, there are other aspects of pollination that are sometimes overlooked. Learning about the process of pollination can help gardeners produce more food and save seed successfully.

How Does Pollination Work?

Pollination occurs when the pollen, a powder containing male reproductive cells, is transferred from one flower’s anthers to another flower’s stigma. As plants can’t make this transfer themselves, they rely on outside forces to move the pollen. Pollination can occur in several ways.

Is Pollination Necessary?

Pollination is necessary for all plants to produce seed. Certain vegetables also require pollination to produce a yield. These include fruiting crops such as tomatoes, squash, beans, and corn. Root and leaf crops like beets and lettuce don’t require pollination to produce a yield but still need to be pollinated to produce seed.

Insect & Animal Pollination

When we think of pollinators, we typically think about bees and butterflies. In reality, various insects and animals pollinate plants, including moths, flies, wasps, birds, and even bats!

Pollination isn’t intentional on the part of the animals or insects. These creatures accidentally transfer pollen from one flower to another while harvesting pollen, nectar, or both.

Bees are considered some of the best pollinators of food crops. Their bodies are covered with bristly hairs which collect pollen electrostatically. The pollen rubs off on other flowers as they continue to collect it. Some native bees, like the Southeastern Blueberry Bee, also specialize in specific plants and do a better job at pollination than other species.

Wind & Water

Wind pollinated crops produce billions of super light pollen grains that are easily carried by the wind. They typically have feathery stigmas to help catch wind-borne pollen. These crops include most grains like corn, barley, wheat, and oats. Many nut trees are also wind-pollinated. 

In our Corn Growing Guide, you may have noticed that it says to plant corn in blocks at least five rows wide for good pollination and well-filled ears. As corn by wind-pollinated, it has a much better chance of being pollinated in larger block plantings than if you plant a row or two.

You may occasionally notice insect pollinators visiting these crops. Bees and other insects may gather pollen but are generally ineffective at pollination.

Water pollination is rare but there are a few species of aquatic plants that rely on pollen transfer through water. 

Human

Why would humans need to pollinate crops? Hand-pollination is typically done when natural pollination is either lacking or undesirable. 

The most well-known example of hand pollination being necessary is vanilla. The vanilla orchid, which is native to Mexico, is pollinated by a specific species of wild bees. Vanilla crops grown in other locations such as Madagascar have to be hand-pollinated because natural pollinators don’t exist.

Natural pollination may be undesirable when breeding plants or avoiding cross-pollination. When trying to breed a new variety or create a specific hybrid, gardeners may rely on hand pollination. You can also use hand-pollination to keep plants from cross-pollinating if you don’t have the space to separate them the necessary distance. Bagging or covering and hand-pollinating flowers will keep your varieties pure.

Hand pollination is simple to do. You need to identify the flower’s anthers and use a cotton swab or small brush like a paintbrush to move pollen to another flower’s anthers.

Keeping these pollination facts in mind can help ensure your garden is a success.

Garden Advice

DIY Insect Hotel

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Insect hotels are an easy way to create habitat for beneficial insects in or near your garden. It’s basically the same concept as a bird house but for bugs instead. You can make yours to help attract solitary bees, wasps, predatory beetles, lacewings, hoverflies and more. These insects play an important role in your garden’s ecosystem, pollinating plants, and feeding on pests. 

To get started I’ll discuss the insect hotel I made as an example. It is made entirely from scrap and natural materials. The outside is scrap plywood and tin and the compartments are filled with bamboo, a log with drilled holes, pine cones, sticks, bark, hay, and bricks. What you make yours from is up to you. You can utilize what you have to create something fairly rustic like I did or get real fancy.

Materials

The bamboo and logs with drilled holes were added with solitary bees and wasps in mind. They both use or create holes, frequently in woody material, to lay their eggs. Predatory beetles and hoverflies can find places to hide and over winter among the pine cones, sticks, and bark. The hay provides good habitat for lacewings and the bricks add larger holes for spiders and other insects to use.

The most important part is add a mix of materials. Think about all the crevices and spaces you normally find insects in and mimic these in your design. If you’d like to attract a specific insect to your garden you can also search for its habitat preferences. Does it like cool damp places close to the ground? Or sunny, dry places up high?

It’s okay if your insect hotel is completely different from the one I created. Just as there’s a wide variety of insects that could use a helping hand there’s a wide variety of habitats you can use your insect hotel to create. A quick Pinterest or Google image search will turn up hundreds of inspiring ideas to help you create something that fits your needs. People have made giant insect towers from stacked pallets and little painted boxes that hang on the wall or fence. You can use hollow logs, stacked cinder blocks, or old terra-cotta pots to stuff with material. 

Construction

To put mine together I measured and then cut the plywood using a circular saw. From there I screwed the plywood together to form a box using some screws leftover from another project. Then I decided to add more plywood to create small compartments or shelves so I could easily add different types of material. I found a perfect size scrap piece of tin that I hand for the roof and screwed that on as well. I haven’t yet, but I need to staple on some scrap chicken wire I have to hold in loose materials like the pine cones. This will also allow me to stuff the materials in tighter.

If you don’t have access to power tools think about ready made containers you could use rather than building a box like I did. Maybe you have an old wooden crate handy or could use an old pot, block, or hollow log like I mentioned above.

Tips

There are a few general ideas that can help you make the most of your insect hotel. First while some insects like damp conditions you might still consider putting something that sheds water on the top. That way your materials will last longer and even if it sits directly on the ground you can keep the upper layers dry for certain species. 

Secondly it’s best to use compostable or recyclable materials. Your insect hotel probably won’t last forever. Building one that can easily be recycled or returned to the earth at the end of it’s use is good planning. Just because straws and pvc pipe have the same shape as bamboo doesn’t mean that they’re good alternatives. 

Consider your hotel’s location carefully. If you have a small space you might have limited choices. However if possible it’s best to place your hotel where it’s sheltered from some of the prevailing winds. If you like bees you may also want to look for a sunny location as they rely heavily on the sun for warmth.  

Lastly don’t stop with just your insect hotel’s structure include some “landscaping” for it too. Insects are more likely to utilize your hotel if you add features around it they like. You can plant a flower mix around it, add a lot of mulch to that area of your garden, let the nearby grass grow tall, or add a place for them to access water.

Insect hotels are a great weekend project. They’re a quick and easy way to help your garden and the natural world. They’re also an excellent project to get kids involved with. Remember that you can make an insect hotel with anything you have on hand, there’s no right or wrong way to make one, and even if it comes out a little wonky it’s okay. The bugs don’t care if you measured everything perfectly!

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