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June 20-26, 2022 is Pollinator Week. As gardeners, we know and love animal and insect pollinators of all kinds and understand the valuable role they play in our ecosystems. Check out the list below from pollinator.org for ways we can support pollinators, and share it with a friend!

What everyone can do for pollinators:
• Watch for pollinators. Get connected with nature. Take a walk, experience the
landscape and look for pollinators’ midday in sunny, planted areas.
• Reduce your impact. Reduce or eliminate your pesticide use, increase green spaces,
and minimize urbanization. Pollution and climate change affect pollinators, too!
• Plant for pollinators. Create pollinator-friendly habitat with native flowering plants that
supply pollinators with nectar, pollen, and homes.


What you can do for pollinators:
• Create a pollinator-friendly garden habitat in just a few simple steps.
• Design your garden so that there is a continuous succession of plants flowering from
spring through fall. Check for the species or cultivars best suited to your area and
gradually replace lawn grass with flower beds.
• Plant native to your region using plants that provide nectar for adults plus food for insect
larvae, such as milkweed for monarchs. If you do use non-native plants, choose ones
that don’t spread easily, since these could become invasive.
• Select old-fashioned varieties of flowers whenever possible because breeding has
caused some modern blooms to lose their fragrance and/or the nectar/pollen needed to
attract and feed pollinators.
• Install ‘houses’ for bats and native bees. For example, use wood blocks with holes or
small open patches of mud. As little as 12” across is sufficient for some bees.
• Avoid pesticides, even so-called “natural” ones such as Bacillus thuringiensis (Bt). If
you must use them, use the most selective and least toxic ones and apply them at night
when most pollinators aren’t active.
• Supply water for all wildlife. A dripping faucet or a suspended milk carton with a pinhole
in the bottom is sufficient for some insects. Other wildlife need a small container of
water.
• Provide water for butterflies without letting it become a mosquito breeding area. Refill
containers daily or bury a shallow plant saucer to its rim in a sunny area, fill it with
coarse pine bark or stones and fill to overflowing with water.
• Share fun facts, such as: a tiny fly (a “midge”) no bigger than a pinhead is responsible
for the world’s supply of chocolate; or one out of every three mouthfuls of food we eat is
delivered to us by pollinators.

Pollinator Week resources and a toolkit full of activities from Pollinator Partnership are available for free here.

For more resources on pollinators, check out these UGA Extension publications.