Plan now to create your pollinator-friendly garden
Gardeners use the winter months to redesign their summer gardens, reimagine their outdoor landscapes and review their plant-purchasing budgets.
This year, perhaps consider focusing on diversifying your garden and landscape to be pollinator friendly.
There are four considerations when creating gardens and landscapes that support pollinator-friendly habitats: Provide food sources; provide water sources; provide shelter; and safeguard the habitat (remove or do not plant invasive species, reduce pesticide use).
As you redesign, reimagine and budget for this year’s garden and landscape, creatively approach how you can incorporate these four considerations in your planning.
Providing food for pollinators is accomplished by installing pollinator-friendly plants in your garden and landscape, preferably plants that are native to our geographic area. Native plants provide the best nectar and pollen sources for pollinators, and many native plants are specific food sources for the larval stages of butterflies and moths.
A helpful reference that identifies pollinator-friendly native trees, shrubs and perennials is found at extension.psu.edu/programs/master-gardener/counties/york/native-plants/fact-sheets/planting-for-pollinators. Using the reference, take an inventory of the plants in your landscape, including trees, shrubs, perennials and groundcovers.
Determine which plants are native and estimate their blooming season. When purchasing additional native plants for your garden, ensure that you provide a balance of bloom times throughout the growing season from spring through fall and a variety of colors, shapes, and sizes to assure a variety of pollinators visit the garden.
Water sources are crucial to pollinator survival. Assess your garden and landscape for existing water sources. Do you have birdbaths or shallow water sources for pollinators? Do you have a bird bath water heater for winter use? Shallow sources serve butterflies and bees; placing a few rocks in bird baths allows bees to alight and drink water. Muddy areas serve as a water and mineral source for bees and other insects.
Where would you imagine the placement of water sources? Determine how and where you can supply water to pollinators throughout the year. Review online resources and videos that provide instructions on how to make a pollinator hydration station, an activity in which the entire family can participate.
Shelter provides areas for bees and pollinators to nest, reproduce and complete their life cycles. Think about shelter areas found in your landscape, such as rock piles or walls, old logs and brush piles.
Do you have patches of bare ground, which invite bumblebees and solitary bees to nest in the ground? Is there leaf litter under your shrubs to support the pupal stages of moths and butterflies? Evaluate existing shelter sources in your garden and landscape and imagine how you can expand or replicate them for each season. If you and your family are looking for winter projects, visit Penn State Extension for video instructions on creating bee houses and other shelters at extension.psu.edu/growing-gardeners-bees-and-pollinators-whats-all-the-buzz-about.
Safeguard your garden and landscape habitats by eliminating invasive species of plants. Note the presence of invasive plants and shrubs, such as Japanese barberry (Berberis thunbergii) and burning bush (Euonymus alatus).
What would your landscape look like if you eradicated your invasive plants and shrubs? Develop a plan to eliminate invasive shrubs and replace them with native, pollinator-friendly varieties. Penn State Extension offers fact sheets on common invasive plants and their management that can help you identify and manage invasive species on your property: extension.psu.edu/forests-and-wildlife/forest-management/invasive-and-competing-plants.
Another strategy for protecting pollinator habitats is the reduction or elimination of pesticide use. Pesticides harm pollinators in all phases of their life cycles. Learn about integrated pest management practices that you can use to eliminate pests without the use of harmful chemicals.
Reflect on your pesticide use in the previous year and the reasons for its application. Integrated Pest Management (IPM) is a decision-making process that applies the least toxic method for controlling pests. Learn more about IPM at extension.psu.edu/programs/master-gardener/counties/chester/how-to-gardening-brochures/ipm-integrated-pest-management or ento.psu.edu/outreach/extension/ipm.
Cold winter days invite us to redesign and reimagine our gardens and landscapes. Plan now for a pollinator-friendly garden that will feed and nurture pollinators in the coming year and in the future.
If you have questions about pollinator-friendly gardening practices, call the Master Gardeners of Butler County Garden Hotline at 724-287 4761, ext. 7, or email the Master Gardeners at butlermg@psu.edu.
Lisa Marie Bernardo and Mary Alice Koeneke are Penn State Extension Master Gardeners of Butler County.
