Pollinator Plantings Simplified ... a Pterodactyl and Solitary Bees

26 April

More than usual number of photographs this week:

One good reason to have a waterfall and small pond in your garden … this beautiful woodpecker, if you have never seen one, is the closest thing to a Pterodactyl on earth. If you see one in flight you will know what I mean. They are a bit bigger than a Crow - quite a bird.

Pileated Woodpecker (male)

Thalictrum thalictroides, the Rue-anemone or Windflower (for European readers, nit at all the same as the ‘windflower’ you know), a herbaceous perennial plant native to woodland in eastern North America.

Male Wild Turkey displaying - wasted effort, there were no females to be seen

White-throated Sparrow, Sanguinaria, Shield Lichen, Pincushion Moss

Daffodill after the rain

Eastern Cottontail

Now, two different species of Mining Bees (Andrena spp) - the larger one may be Dunning’s Mining Bee, the smaller ones with the large pollen baskets on their hind legs are about half the size of the other one and sorry, I can’t go as far as species for their ID. These are ground nesting, solitary bees, with a preference for sandy soils that they can dig tunnels in. Usually they are one of the first of the bees to emerge and are seen alongside the freshly flowering Sanguinaria.

Lastly, a specimen of the Greater Bee Fly (Bombylius major) flew in front of my lens - I did not get sharp focus on it, but you will an idea of what it looks like. This fellow is a fly, not a bee and it mimics bumble bees. It is parasitic in that it uses this mimicry to gain close access to host solitary bee and wasp nests in order to deposit its eggs. After hatching, the larvae find their way into the nests to parasitically feed on the bee larvae. Plays a modest role in flower pollination.

Native “pollinator-friendly” planting made simple

There is a lack of agreement in scientific circles as to exactly what is a ”pollinator plant’ and even “what is a native plant”. I recently read a fascinating, and very accessible book that you might wish to get hold of. It brings some clarity to the discussion (Title: No Nettles Needed by Ken Thompson). The author makes the obvious, even if cynical, point that you should not rely too heavily on lists of native pollinator plants that you find in garden centres or in books by garden writers who may not also be scientists but are interested in selling you plants and books. He offers the following suggestions which make life much simpler for anyone wanting to develop a “pollinator friendly garden:

In fact his rules for attracting pollinators are mainly common sense. Don’t get lost in the weeds, just abide by these suggestions and you won’t go far wrong:

1. Grow plants with lots of flowers - any flowers. :Pollinators are not interested in a plant that is not in flower. Don’t overdo conifers, ferns, grasses and sedges.

2. Grow plants in large blocks, rather than as scattered individuals. This makes it easier for insects to find what they need.

3. Make sure that there’s something in flower right through the season, from hellebores, pulmonarias, aubretia, cherries and mahonias in spring, through to Michaelmas daisies, Sedum spectabile and ivy in the autumn. Try to put at least some of your spring flowers in a warm, sheltered spot.

4. Grow a good mixture of flower types: open and flat for beetles and hoverflies (for example, fennel, geraniums, saxifrages, spiraea), tubular and harder to access for large bees and long-tongued insects (foxgloves, campanulas, antirrhinums, and salvias), and night-scented for moths (nicotiana, honeysuckle).

5. Especially in a small garden, grow plants with a long flowering season, such as fuchsias, lavender, rosemary, Potentilla fruticosa, Native (mostly, but no need to be a purist) Honeysuckles and Hypericum (St. John’s Wort) especially the variety ‘Hidcote’.

6. Avoid plants with double or otherwise highly modified flowers. Some of these are developed in the horticultural trade as “eye candy” because they sell profitably, but in the breeding selection process access to the pollen is often made remarkably hard for insects that seek it.

7. Trust your own judgement. Make a note of plants that attract pollinators in your neighbours’ and friends’ gardens, or while out garden visiting, and grow them. If you already grow them, grow some more. Notice that these are mostly things the average gardener is probably doing anyway. In other words, you and the bees and butterflies will get along fine if you garden mostly to please yourself.

Added to which, these are specifically for attracting and supporting birds :

1. Grow plants that produce seeds such as asters, golden rod, Rudbeckia, cone flowers, Joe-Pye weed, sunflowers and the like. Doing not remove the seed heads but leave them for birds to pick over through the winter.

2. Grow flowers that support insects (see above) because insects and their larvae are important food for birds, especially when raising nestlings.

3. Grow bushes that produce fruits - dogwoods, Viburnum, serviceberry, mountain ash are examples but also wild cherries and plums, winterberry, sumac etc. Many of them have gorgeous blossom in spring to please the gardener’s eye.

Not many technicalities there, and all simple to follow without getting too purist abut their native credentials. I know that is a controversial statement, but if you read the book you will learn the reasoning.

Feederwatch

We are at the end of Feederwatch - this weekend we will have completed our 27th Feederwatch season in a row. We then get six months of summer to smell the roses before starting season 28.

Feederwatch is a joint research and education project run by Birds Canada and the Cornell Lab of Ornithology that depends on volunteers to note and record birds in a fixed location for a six month winter season from November to the end of April. This citizen science project builds extremely valuable data about bird populations during this cold and vulnerable period of the year which guide decisions relating to conservation management. In our case this is keeping records of birds that visit the garden each weekend.

Purely in the garden over the winter months we have seen 34 species of birds for Feederwatch - probably more but the watch is only two days a week. Over the years we have had 55 species on those two days a week. Not bad for suburbia.

Red-winged Blackbird