In addition to providing milkweed, we must protect the monarch’s overwintering trees. But simply providing a ton of milkweed is not enough to protect this migratory, multigenerational species. ![]() It is well known that monarch butterfly caterpillars will only feed on Asclepias (milkweed) species. The monarch butterfly-the poster child in the effort to protect native pollinators-is a great example of the complexities involved in saving just one species. Similarly, the hover fly is an important pollinator and visitor to flowers as an adult but feeds on aphids and other pest species as larvae. ![]() Many wasp species feed on nectar as adults, pollinating flowers, but as larvae they require an insect food source provided by the parent. When talking about pollinators we must be aware of the complex lives they live beyond the flowers they visit. Many pollinators, including many species of bee, moth, butterfly, and mammals, require specific nesting and over-wintering grounds such as cavities of dead trees, stems of perennial plants, and leaf litter. Providing host plants for juvenile stages, over-wintering habitat, and nesting grounds are all additional ways to support pollinators. It is all well and good to have a garden full of flowering plants with pollen and nectar sources, but that’s only half the battle in promoting native pollinator diversity. This perspective doesn’t take into account the millions of years of specialization through co-evolution between thousands of our richly diverse plant and insect species. Rowanįocusing on one non-native pollinator as the savior to all our fruiting needs is a concerning and limited perspective. Unfortunately, many of our native bee populations are in steep decline, forcing us to rely on honey bees to shoulder much of our food crop pollination. The non-native honey bee, for example, is nowhere near as skilled at pollinating squashes, berries, and fruit trees as some of our native bees like squash bees and orchard bees (pictured below). Native pollinators are the most adept at pollinating native plants, but many are also more adept at pollinating many of our crop plants too. Some bees, like our native bumble bees, have specialized areas on their legs they are able to pack pollen into. Most bees are covered in branched hairs allowing them to carry pollen. Not only do plants evolve special mechanisms for pollination, but most of our native bee species specialize on specific flowers and all have evolved structures and means by which they collect pollen. When the bee flies off to the next flower, it takes away plenty of pollen on its furry body, which is transferred to the next flower, and so on. When a bee lands within the flower, the weight of the bee springs the anthers loose, slapping the bee on the back with pollen. This helps prevent the flower from losing pollen in storms or wind. The cup shaped flowers have their anthers stuck into little pits at the base. One of my favorite pollination techniques comes from the mountain laurel, Kalmia latifolia. ![]() Specialized structures, scents, color spectrums, and mimicry are all employed by plants to make themselves more attractive to their pollinator cohorts. Flowering plants have spent millions of years developing diverse strategies to attract pollinators in order to successfully spread their pollen. As flowers contain the reproductive part of the plant, the shape of the flower and its mechanism for pollination is dictated by years of co-evolution with the creatures that pollinate it. As the number of flowering plant species increased on our planet, so too did the number of pollinator insects. In fact, the first record of insect pollination is from over 100 million years ago. Native angiosperms (flowering plants) have co-evolved with pollinators for millions of years. With over 300,000 species of flowering plant worldwide, pollinators are essential for sustaining most terrestrial food webs. Native pollinators facilitate plant reproduction, and plants are the base of our trophic levels providing energy up the food chain. ![]() The more diverse the traits, the more likely adaptations will occur for plants to withstand extreme climatic events. Pollination allows plants to reproduce and spread their genetics, resulting in diverse traits which can help in the survivorship of the species. Plants are either wind-pollinated, like grasses and many trees, or animal-pollinated. For a plant to set seed and make fruit, it must be pollinated.
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