Pollinator Week, June 19-25, 2023

Pollinator Week is an international celebration of the valuable ecosystem services provided by bees, birds, butterflies, bats and beetles. The week of June 19-25 will spotlight a unique opportunity to learn about some fascinating and important animals, the pollinators.

Tiger swallowtail on Monarda

Often overlooked or misunderstood, pollinators are in fact responsible for 1 out of every 3 bites of food that we eat. Beginning in 2006, pollinators started to decline rapidly in numbers. Participating in Pollinator Week can help save these important animals.

MJ Frogge

What you can do to help pollinators:

• Educated yourself on pollinators that live in your area.

https://xerces.org/pollinator-conservation/about-pollinators

• Avoid pesticides in your home landscape.
• Plant a pollinator garden using native plants.

https://xerces.org/pollinator-conservation/pollinator-friendly-plant-lists

• Consider certifying your pollinator habitat.

https://extension.unl.edu/statewide/douglas-sarpy/nebraska-pollinator-habitat-certification/

• Provide nesting sites, like bee houses or insect hotels, for pollinators.
• https://xerces.org/publications/fact-sheets/nesting-overwintering-habitat

• Provide a water source such as a bird bath, small pond or water feature.
• Go to the Pollinator Partnership web site to learn more about pollinators. http://pollinator.org/
• Share the information you learn with others.
• Establish green corridorsby working with your neighbors to include several backyards in a pollinator habitat plan.
• Attend a pollinator event.

Pollinator Week

Teaching Youth About Pollinators

Happy Pollinator Week! This week our office is hosting 4-H Clover College. Twelve youth signed up for my session called Pollinator Party. We discussed what crops need pollinators. They looked at the list and circled foods they eat. I then asked them to highlighted a favorite food. I asked how they would feel if they could never have that food again. The shocked look on their faces was clear. They are starting to understand the importance of pollinators.

It was a beautiful day to be out in the Cherry Creek Pollinator Habitat. They notice the native flowers that were blooming. Many were fascinated by the solitary bee house and watching the leaf cutter bees fill the holes that were drilled in the wood blocks. They planted dill and zinnia seeds to benefit caterpillars and butterflies.

After exploring the habitat, each youth made a solitary bee tube house to take home and place in their landscape. It was a fun morning and by the end of the session, the kids had a better understanding of our native pollinators and how their habitat is important to protect. 

MJ Frogge

Leafcutter Bees in the Habitat

Happy Pollinator Week! Leafcutter bees are active in the Cherry Creek Pollinator Habitat. Leafcutter bees are important pollinators and are members of the family Megachilidae. I added new blocks and paper straws for leafcutter bees in the solitary bee house. You know you have leafcutter bees in your landscape when you see the discs of leaves that are snipped from nearby plants. The damage is very minimal and will not harm the plants. Leafcutter bees are not aggressive, so you can safely be close and watch them work.

To make a solitary bee house, check out this NebGuide: https://extensionpublications.unl.edu/assets/pdf/g2256.pdf

MJ Frogge

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Pollinator Week! What is Blooming?

Happy Pollinator Week!! It is a great time to visit the Cherry Creek Pollinator Habitat. So many wonderful plants are blooming in June. Rudbeckia, hoary vervain, common milk weed, butterfly milkweed, purple poppy mallow, common yarrow, beebalm and fleabane. All these plants are great for our pollinators.

MJ Frogge

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Happy Pollinator Week!

Happy National Pollinator Week!  I hope you are able to start a pollinator habitat this year or add plants to the habitat you already have in your landscape. Gardening has become very popular this year, so more people are outside and hopefully noticing pollinators. There are many ways to celebrate pollinator week:

1. Plant Native Plants. Native plants provides native pollinators with food in the form of pollen and nectar. Select plants that have a long bloom time. Also grow a wide selection of plants so you have plants blooming April through October.
2. Let your yard get a little messy. Leave unhazardous snags for nesting places and stack tree limbs to create a brush pile, which is a great source of cover for pollinators. Build an insect hotel or bee house in your landscape.
3. Create or protect water sources. Bees need water to drink. Create a water feature with rocks for insects to land. Be sure to keep birdbaths clean and change the water three times per week when mosquitoes are breeding.
4. Limit or eliminate pesticide use. By using fewer or no chemicals in the landscape you will help keep pollinator populations healthy.
5. Identify non-native invasive plants. Work to remove them from your yard. Do not bring any new invasive plants into your habitat. Invasive plants do not provide as much quality food or habitat as native plants do and can threaten healthy ecosystems.

MJ Frogge

Celebrate Pollinator Week

There are many ways you can help pollinators:

1. Plant Native Plants. Native flora provides native pollinators with food in the form of pollen and nectar. Select plants that have a long bloom time. Also grow a wide selection of plants so you have plants blooming April through October.
2. Let your yard get a little messy. Leave unhazardous snags for nesting places and stack down tree limbs to create a brush pile, which is a great source of cover for pollinators.
3. Create or protect water sources. Bees need water to drink. Create a water feature with rocks for insects to land. Be sure to keep birdbaths clean and change the water three times per week when mosquitoes are breeding.
4. Limit or eliminate pesticide use. By using fewer or no chemicals in the landscape you will help keep pollinator populations healthy.
5. Identify non-native invasive plants. Work to remove them from your yard. Do not bring any new invasive plants into your habitat. Invasive plants do not provide as much quality food or habitat as native plants do and can threaten healthy ecosystems.

MJ Frogge

September 2016

Liatris

Pollinator Week 2019!

Happy Pollinator Week! Today in the Cherry Creek Pollinator Habitat the leaf cutter bees are very active.  I can see where they have visited a seedling ash tree.  Each disc of leaf that is clipped will become part of a cell that houses an individual leaf cutter bee egg. One of my favorite things to do is to check the bee house each week to see how may drilled blocks have been filled.

This NebGuide will help you make one for your habitat:

Click to access g2256.pdf

MJ Frogge

Pollinator Week 2018!

Happy National Pollinator Week!  There are many ways to celebrate pollinator week:

1. Plant Native Plants. Native plants provides native pollinators with food in the form of pollen and nectar. Select plants that have a long bloom time. Also grow a wide selection of plants so you have plants blooming April through October.
2. Let your yard get a little messy. Leave unhazardous snags for nesting places and stack tree limbs to create a brush pile, which is a great source of cover for pollinators. Build an insect hotel or bee house in your landscape.
3. Create or protect water sources. Bees need water to drink. Create a water feature with rocks for insects to land. Be sure to keep birdbaths clean and change the water three times per week when mosquitoes are breeding.
4. Limit or eliminate pesticide use. By using fewer or no chemicals in the landscape you will help keep pollinator populations healthy.
5. Identify non-native invasive plants. Work to remove them from your yard. Do not bring any new invasive plants into your habitat. Invasive plants do not provide as much quality food or habitat as native plants do and can threaten healthy ecosystems.

If you live in or near Lincoln, attend this event:

 “Pollinators on the Plaza”  

Wednesday, June 20, 2018   4-6 pm

Union Plaza, 21st & P Streets, Lincoln Nebraska

Public educational fair for all ages including:

• Pollinator planting/garden tours
• Information/educational booths with handouts and/or hands on activities
• Food vendors using pollinator based products (honey, etc)
• Pollinator bee displays, honey bee observation hive, monarch display, native bees
• Pollinator Yoga
• And more….

MJ Frogge

Butterflies

Red Admiral and Monarch butterflies have been spotted in the Cherry Creek Pollinator Habitat. They were both seen on common milkweed which is blooming now. Plant milkweed for National Pollinator Week.

MJ Frogge

National Pollinator Week

It is National Pollinator Week! I am happy to share that the Nebraska Pollinator Habitat Certification program has revised its application with an updated and bigger plant list! Hope you will consider applying to this program. Take a look at the application for the list of plants you might add to your landscape to benefit pollinators.

http://entomology.unl.edu/pollinator-habitat-certification

MJ Frogge