Pollinator gardens and more

A day doesn’t go by without hearing about a new pollinator garden. It is encouraging to see the growing number of people who realize that it is important to do something for bees and all the other pollinators. We are becoming increasingly aware of their important role in the pollination of crops and wild flowers and in the maintenance of ecosystems. We know that some pollinators have been in decline for a number of years, due in part to the loss of wild flowers.

In its simplest way a pollinator garden is a wild flower garden with some adequate habitat for nesting and, needless to say, free from pesticides. Now, a group in England, called the Cooperative, is taking this a step further by developing a more systematic approach to this matter. They are creating corridors for pollinator wildlife by the name of “bee roads”. Such bee roads would provide interconnected habitats for pollinators. Habitat connectivity is very important because it prevents populations from becoming isolated and thus it help maintain the biodiversity of the gene pools (all the genes present in a population).

They are starting small but plan to expand the project with the cooperation of land owners, by providing incentives for the creation of these roads of wild flowers along cultivated fields.

You can read more here News England and watch the BBC video (if you don’t mind the brief commercial at the beginning)


I hope that this initiative will inspire people in this country to start a similar project.

More on pollinator gardens in North America:
U S Fish and Wildlife
Bee-friendly gardens
Penn State
Xerces society

List of articles

© Beatriz Moisset. 2012