Your Flower Garden Can Help Save the Bees
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Are bees buzzing around your cutting flowers? You probably see honeybees. And do you see other bees? You’re likely seeing far more than honeybees. Honeybees are from Europe and most of the ones you see are someone’s livestock out foraging for nectar they’ll turn into honey. But there are many native bees and they’re real workhorse pollinators.
Bees aren’t the only pollinators. You’ve probably noticed all kinds of insects visiting your flowers in the garden. There are wasps (they won’t hurt you), flies, moths, butterflies, beetles, hummingbirds, and even bats in some areas. Some pollinators are quite tiny!
Many of the flowers we plant for cutting can double as food for bees and other pollinators. And with a few thoughtful additions to our flower gardens we can provide the habitat they need so we can significantly help to save the bees and other pollinators. In fact it’s vital we do this.
On this page
Pollinators are in decline
The decline in pollinators was noticed by the end of the 1990’s. But in 2006 honeybee keepers were losing hives at a rate of up to 50%. That’s when the world took notice. Since these were the bees being used for crop pollination, this rate of loss was scary news.
Research was done on honeybees. But also on bumblebees, since they’re significant wild pollinators and their decline had been observed. Several reasons factored into the decline. These include habitat loss, pesticides and herbicides, pests and diseases, and nutritional deficits. Research has helped improve the health of honeybees. But far less is known about the bumblebee and the rest of the native bees and other pollinators.
Pollinators are needed for up to 80% of our crops, but about 87.5% of the world’s flowering plant species depend on pollinators for fruit and seed production. This includes the plants in the wild— those that feed wildlife, maintain soil and water health, and give us nature itself.
In September 2021 the US Fish and Wildlife service announced that the American Bumblebee’s populations have plummeted by nearly 90% and may warrant Endangered Species Act protection. The bee has disappeared or is very rare in 16 states.
And there’s less known about many of the rest of the 3,600 native bee species in North America. According to the Center for Biological Diversity and the USDA wild bees had declined by 23% between 2008 and 2013!
But each of us with a flower garden or a landscape of any sort, can truly help save the bees and other pollinators.
We actually offer the best hope for helping them
Our gardens can significantly help pollinators
A public garden in Delaware, called Mt. Cuba, is devoted to native plants. It was the spot for ecologist David Sarver to survey the numbers and species of bees that visited the gardens.
Three areas were chosen, two natural wooded areas and one intensely planted garden of native plants. Mr. Sarver found many bees that had never been seen in Delaware and several that were of concern due to low numbers over a large region. (Read the full Washington Post article here.)
The most interesting thing is that the greatest diversity of bees was found in the gardens. Not in the wild.
What this tells us is that planting a diversity of flowering plants with a focus on natives, to create a pollinator garden, provides a lifeline to dwindling pollinator populations, and even boosting them.
That means each of us can help by creating pollinator gardens. And with our flower gardens we’re off to a good start!
Two components are needed for pollinators; food supply and habitat. An overview follows, and I go into greater detail in Grow These Flowers for the Bees and How to Provide Habitat for the Bees in Your Flower Garden.
Provide pollinators with flowers
Pollinators need pollen and nectar from flowers. Some flowers are more nutritious for pollinators need while others aren’t. So including a wide variety of flowers is important.
Since native bees and other pollinators evolved with native plants, pollinator gardens must focus on having a high number of flowering native plants. They’ll provide the best nutrition.(This may be easier than it sounds!)
Pollinators need food for the entire season, so you’ll need a variety of flowers for a steady, season-long bloom. For each bloom season, try to have at least three different flower species bloom at a time. And aim for a three foot square patch of each.
So for a seven month bloom season, assuming a one month bloom time for each plant, you’d need 3 square feet per flower type, times 3 varieties, which is 9 square feet. Times 7 months, and you have 63 sq. ft. of planting space for each bloom season. That’s all!
Native plants are important for feeding pollinators. And they have an added benefit to the gardener—they need no fertilizer, are often deer resistant, require very little irrigation, and they are not necessarily more flammable.
Provide pollinators with habitat
Pollinators need a place to live and reproduce. Offering the habitat close to the flowers they feed on saves the energy they need to forage, allowing them to flourish.
They need resting areas and shelter from the wind in trees and shrubs. Those with shaggy bark offer some pollinators overwintering protection.
They need nesting areas to lay their eggs and feed their young. Many native bees nest in the ground, so include patches of bare dirt. They also may use old rotting logs, rocks with crevices, and rock walls. Rotting logs provide a lot of pollinators’ nesting sites. But they’re also very flammable in the event of a fire. So please keep these at least 30 ft. away from your structures and from other vegetative fuels.
Maintaining your plants the right way can provide many native bees with much needed nesting sites.
If you’re short on space there are lots of ideas for building human-made nests, and ideas for stacking various nesting structures to help provide suitable nesting sites. Look them up online, but beware, they must be cleaned every year.
Situate your garden in full sun, 6 hours of direct sun a day. Pollinators need sun for many of their activities. But pollinator food plants can be in part shade gardens as well.
All pollinators need fresh clean water. Butterflies even need some mud. A little trickle of water into a shallow dish with landing spots for them, and spilling over into soil for mud will help them.
Find a good spot for a pollinator garden
Pollinator gardens can be their breeding grounds, which give us the best hope to save and bring back endangered pollinators. So it’s nothing but rewarding.
Take a look at your land to see where you can start your own pollinator garden. If you have the space (and the resources), consider devoting a larger area to pollinators! It can be 63sq. ft. or up to 5,000 sq. ft. It can be filled with low maintenance, native flowers (some good for cutting) in addition to your cutting flowers! Start small if you need to.
If you have a small space, even a few flowers will help. Watch who visits your flowers, you’ll see the native pollinators. That alone is worth it.
Further reading
Grow These Flowers for the Bees For cutting gardens especially
How to Provide Habitat for the Bees in Your Garden Please know that these are gentle native bees that do not sting (unless your really bother them).
This Bee-Killing Pesticide May be in Your Flowers
The Bees in Your Backyard, A Guide to North America’s Bees *by Joseph S. Wilson and Olivia Messinger Carril This book is a great resource to starting to notice and identify the plethora of bees that are around us. And it’s not just honeybees! It also shows you how to know bees from wasps, and flies.
Main References
The Pollinator Victory Garden: Win the War on Pollinator Decline with Ecological Gardening*, by Kim Eierman, Quarry Books, 2020
Bumble Bees of the Western United States, Xerces Society
Conserving Bumblebees, Xerces Society
Center for Biological Diversity
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