Pollinator LIVE
While pollinators may come in small sizes, they play a large and often undervalued role in the production of the food we eat, the health
Read more +Learn About:
- Learn About Pollination and It's Importance on Our Food Supply
- Discover the Biology of Pollinators and Citizen Science Projects
- Honey Bees, Native Bees, Gardening, and More
- Designing, Planning, and Creating Schoolyard Gardens
- Bees Can Teach Science! Meet Standards by Studying Pollinators in the Field and Classroom
- Available in Spanish
Nature's Partners: Pollinators, Plants, and People
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Nature's Partners: Pollinators, Plants, and People
Nature’s Partners: Pollinators, Plants, and People was webcast and broadcast, in English and Spanish at the Lady Bird Johnson Wildflower Center in Austin, Texas. Scientists and educators explain pollination, plant-insect interactions, how to study pollinators, their importance to the food supply, and what people can do to help.Scientists and educators explain pollination, plant-insect interactions, how to study pollinators, their importance to the food supply, and what people can do to help.
Polinizadore En VIVO: Socios con la Naturaleza
Únase con nosotros en Austin, Texas, en el Centro de Flores Silvestres de Lady Bird Johnson, el cual es dedicado a la conservación de plantas natales y flores campestres para restaurar la belleza y la riqueza biológica de Norteamérica. Conozca de cerca a los polinizadores y a sus plantas, y aprenda cómo las personas se benefician del proceso de polinización.
Webcast: The Insect Zoo in Your Schoolyard
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Overview of Pollination (English)
One out of every three bites of food arrives on our tables as the result of a pollinator. What is pollination and how does it work?
Pollinator Partners
Plants depend on insects for pollination and are partners in this process.
“Bee” a Scientist
Dr. John Pickering, an ecology professor at the University of Georgia, talks about how he became a scientist.
Monarch Update
Dr. Chip Taylor, Director of Monarch Watch, provides the latest research on monarch butterflies as of spring 2010.
Attracting Pollinators to Your Schoolyard Garden
Learn what you can do to help pollinators in your school garden or community.
Webcast: Honey Bees, Native Bees, Gardening, and More
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Pollinator LIVE: Introduction to the Washington Youth Garden
Green dreams sprout at the Washington Youth Garden where students plant and harvest vegetables and tend native plants. Washington Youth Garden program director Kaifa Anderson Hall talks about the garden.
Pollinator LIVE: Native Bees
Learn about our native and honey bees, the important role they play in the environment, threats to these pollinators, and how you can help. Naturalist Alonso Abugattas talks about native bees and their importance to pollution.
Pollinator LIVE: Insect Hunt
Bees aren’t the only pollinators in the garden. Watch to learn about bats, beetles, flies, and other insect pollinators. USDA Forest Service entomologist and students go on an insect hunt.
Pollinator LIVE: Pollinator Kitchen and Cafe
Join us in the Pollinator Kitchen and Café and learn about nutritious foods developed through pollination. Learn about composting with Woodsy Owl and watch the Rubbish Rot Rap.
Playlists
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Pollinator LIVE: Tour of the Washington Youth Garden
Watch VideoGreen dreams sprout at the Washington Youth Garden where students plant and harvest vegetables and tend native plants.
Back to TopPollinator LIVE: The Insect Zoo in Your Schoolyard
Watch VideoOne out of every three bites of food arrives on our tables as the result of a pollinator. What is pollination and how does it work?
Pollinator Live: Insect Zoo - Pollinator Partners
Watch VideoJoin Sean Brady and Nate Erwin from the Smithsonian’s Natural History Museum and Insect Zoo, and take a closer look at local and exotic pollinators.
Pollinator LIVE: Insect Zoo - Bee a Scientist
Pollinator LIVE: Insect Zoo - Monarch Update
Watch VideoDr. Chip Taylor, Director of Monarch Watch, provides the latest research on monarch butterflies.
Pollinator LIVE: Insect Zoo - Attracting Pollinators
Pollinator LIVE: Native and Honey Bees
Watch VideoLearn about our native and honey bees, the important role they play in the environment, threats to these pollinators, and how you can help.
Pollinator LIVE: Bats, Butterflies, and Other Pollinators
Pollinator LIVE: Pollinator Kitchen and Cafe
Pollinator LIVE: Other Pollinators
Watch VideoBees aren’t the only pollinators in the garden. Learn about bats, beetles, flies, and other insect pollinators.
Goals and Objectives
The goal of PollinatorLIVE: A Distance Learning Adventure is to meet national science education standards and promote conservation action through education and awareness. The objectives are as follows:
- Increase understanding of pollinators and their importance.
- Understand the partnership between plants and pollinators.
- Understand the characteristics of pollinators that make them uniquely suited to the task of pollination.
- Encourage schools and classrooms to take action to help pollinators by developing pollinator gardens and schoolyard habitats.
- Increase participation in and understanding of citizen science programs related to plants and their pollination.
- Learn the importance of being a good steward.
- Understand the role of citizens, public land management agencies, and non-governmental organizations in protecting and conserving habitat.
Pollinator Overview
Many people think only of allergies when they hear the word pollen. But pollination — the transfer of pollen grains to fertilize the seed-producing ovaries of flowers — is an essential part of a healthy ecosystem. Pollinators play a significant role in the production of over 150 food crops in the United States — among them apples, alfalfa, almonds, blueberries, cranberries, kiwis, melons, pears, plums, and squash.
Bees, both managed honey bees and native bees, are the primary pollinators. In the United States, the annual benefit of managed honey bees to consumers is estimated at $14.6 billion. The services provided by native pollinators further contribute to the productivity of crops as well as to the survival and reproduction of many native plants.
However, more than 100,000 invertebrate species, including bees, moths, butterflies, beetles, flies, hummingbirds, ants, and wasps serve as pollinators — as well as 1,035 species of vertebrates, including birds, mammals, and reptiles.
Bats play a key role in many ecosystems. They pollinate the fragrant, white or pale flowers that bloom and night and disperse the seeds of more than 300 plant species. Can you imagine life without cashews, mangos, carob, dates, figs, papaya, guava and cloves? These are a few of the many plants which depend on bats for their survival.
Bats, hummingbirds, ants, beetles, wasps, butterflies, moths, flies and even lizards are “busy as bees” each spring and summer pollinating flowers.
Did you know that some of the world’s top pollinators are flies? Long-tongue flies, gnats, and yes, even male mosquitoes! Some male mosquitoes help to pollinate rare orchids; the pollen grains actually stick to their eyes as they travel from flower to flower. When they dip their proboscis (mouth tube) into the flower to take a sip of nectar, the pollen grains mix and pollination takes place.
A lot of pollinating flies, like hover flies and bee flies, disguise themselves as bees or wasps. Flies use this mimicry to protect themselves against predators. If an insect looks like it might sting, a predator might not try to eat it. How can you tell the difference between a honeybee and a bee fly? Check out the wings. If the insect has one pair of wings, it’s a fly. Two pairs? A bee.
Despite the valuable services that pollinators provide, long-term population trends for some North American pollinators are “demonstrably downward,” says a new report from the National Research Council1.
Observable decreases in wild populations of bees, butterflies, and moths are of great concern to producers of fruits, vegetables, nuts, alfalfa, and flowers. These crops depend on wild and domestic pollinators. Growers in California, Florida, Arizona, Utah, Washington, and Hawaii are especially concerned. More important is the disturbing notion of an imbalance in the natural ecosystem and biodiversity on which all food production depends. Habitat loss for pollinators by human activity poses an immediate and frequently irreversible threat. Other factors responsible for population decreases include invasive plant species, broad-spectrum pesticide use, disease, and weather.
For the most part, the general public is unaware of the decrease in pollinator populations and the implications this has for agricultural production.“Status of Pollinators in North America, ” Committee on the Status of Pollinators in North America, National Research Council
Gardening
Grants
Congratulations to the following schools and organizations that received GreenWorks! grants from Project Learning Tree and the USDA Forest Service to create gardens for pollinators in their schoolyards and communities. These merit-based grants were awarded to students and teachers participating in PollinatorLIVE: A Distance Learning Adventure.
State City School/Organization Project Name & Description AL Birmingham Cawaco RC&D Council, Horticultural Therapy Program PLANT PROJECT™: Pairs special-needs children at Clay-Chalkville School with adults in senior/assisted living facilities to develop a pollinator garden. The garden will also serve as an outdoor classroom for the school. AR Pea Ridge Pea Ridge School District Rain and Pollinator Garden: Seventh-grade students will create the garden, to be used as an outdoor learning space and also to help a part of the school grounds that experiences drainage problems. CA Newbury Park EARTHS Magnet School EARTHS Community Garden: Students at this K-5 magnet school will design plant and maintain the garden, which will include a native pollinator labyrinth. CA Auburn Placer Nature Center Native Bee Sanctuaries: The nature center will involve families and youth, preschool through college, in creating native bee sanctuaries. CA Torrance West High School Native Plant Garden: AP Biology and AP Environmental Science students will study California native plants and then design, prepare and plant a native plant garden on campus. GA Stone Mountain Stone Mountain Elementary The Phoenix Project: Led by the GEN Club, students will replace and refurbish gardens destroyed by the drought of 2010, including a pollinator garden in front of the school HI Anahola Kanuikapono New Century Public Charter School Busy Bees Native Pollinator Garden: Students K-12 will expand the school’s indigenous plants garden and establish a beehive lab. ID Moscow University of Idaho Women in Science Stateline Wetlands Pollinator Garden: Students, K-16, will create two pollinator gardens at either end of the eight-acre Stateline Wetland. KS Melvern Marais Des Cygnes Valley High School Melvern Riverfront Park and Trails Pollinator Garden: Students will develop the garden at a park next to their school. They will collect data about it through Project Bud Burst and PollinatorLIVE in spring and fall. MI Owosso DeVries Nature Conservancy Pollinator Buffer Garden: Homeschooled and Youth Advisory Council students will plan, create and maintain the garden, using native MI genotypes, next to an heirloom vegetable patch on the grounds of the Conservancy. MN Buffalo Wright Technical Center/Wright Learning Center WTC/WLC Land Restoration Project: Students will restore a 5.2 acre section of the school grounds with native species to increase biodiversity. It will be an outdoor classroom and center for eight cooperative school districts and the surrounding community. NJ Livingston Joseph Kushner Hebrew Academy/Sinai School for Special Needs Gen Tikvah/Garden of Hope: Students, preK-12, will renew a neglected garden, and also relate it to “I Never Saw Another Butterfly,” written by a child during the Holocaust. NJ Little Egg Harbor Little Egg Harbor School District Egg Garden: Frog Pond School will create a garden with pollinating plants alongside a pond. They will also involve Boy Scouts and seniors. NM Tijeras Talking Talons Youth Leadership Bees-2-Please: Youth and the Route 66 Community Garden Club will create a community pollinator garden, which will also have interpretive signs for the public. NV Reno Urban Roots Garden Classroom Pollinate for a Better State: Reno-area schools will develop a native garden at the Urban Roots farm. They will also use the garden to focus on the role of native ecology in the health of the state. NY Brooklyn Compost for Brooklyn Bug Land Builders: Students at PS 213 Brooklyn Dreams Charter School, a preschool, and other groups will start seeds indoors, then transplant to a pollinator garden on the site of Compost for Brooklyn. OH North Lima Goodness Grows Bloomin’ Butterfly Garden: Columbiana High School special needs students will design and build a butterfly garden at Goodness Grows, a nonprofit center near Youngstown. OH Burton Berkshire High School Public Schools and Pollinators!: Students will take the lead in developing a pollinator garden as a solution to excess water run-off. An important component is to invite members of the community so they see the connection between academic learning and community service. OR Gresham Pleasant Valley School The Birds and The Bees: Students K-6 will research, plan, and plant a pollinator hedgerow and develop signage, which will go along the playground bordering a meadow. This is part of a restoration project in which students have planted 3,000 native trees and shrubs over the past four years. PA Ulysses Northern Potter School District Cold Climate Pollinator Gardening in the Headwaters of Pennsylvania: K-12 students will develop a plant community that supports pollinators, provides a science-based curriculum of four-season gardening in a cold climate, and becomes a community focal point. TN Murfreesboro Murfreesboro Parks and Recreation, and City Schools F.U.N. (Families Understanding Nature/Nutrition): As a way to reduce the childhood nature deficit, reduce childhood obesity, and increase physical activity, students will develop outdoor classrooms and habitats at two sites. TX Friendswood Brookside Intermediate School Pollinators Aplenty: Middle school students will develop a garden that focuses on the need for pollinators and their contribution to food and seed production. TX Nacogdoches Friends of the National Forests and Grasslands of Texas, Latino Legacy, Amigos del Bosque Ninos del Jardin: Fourth and fifth graders will be involved in a collaborative effort to create two community gardens with plants for pollinators: one at Thomas J Rusk Elementary and one at a demonstration garden nearby. VA Manassas Ashland Elementary PTO Earth Day Garden: Create an outdoor learning laboratory to support the science curriculum of each grade level, including a pollinator garden, with a butterfly house and a bat house planned. VA Bluemont Village Montessori School at Bluemont Village of Pollen: Students will develop the garden habitat in a meadow setting, with additional plantings in woodlands and pond-side. They will create signage and lead tours. VA Manassas New Dominion Alternative Education Center and Prince William County Schools Science Office Exploring Nature’s Beauty Garden: Students will create a pollinator garden, and teachers will use it to conduct authentic, hands-on exploration. WI Green Bay Howard-Suamico School District: Students Achieving in Life Alternative Program Hope Grows Garden: Students, grades 7-12, will develop a garden with the assistance of community volunteers and district staff. Vegetables grown will be donated to an area food pantry. WI Madison Goodman Community Center Honey Bees and Butterflies at Goodman: Students will develop a garden, butterfly houses, and beehive near an existing large community garden. Students in the center’s grounds and maintenance program will have primary responsibility. Additional Grants
A number of other organizations provide funding for schoolyard or community gardens.
Kids Gardening
https://kidsgardening.org/garden-grants/
Kids Gardening / National Gardening Association offer grants and list other organizations that do as well.Project Learning Tree
https://www.plt.org/apply-for-greenworks-environmental-education-grant
Do you have an idea for a school/community native plant garden, a forest improvement project, a streamside restoration plan, a recycling program, or energy conservation project for your students? Need funds to implement it? Apply for a Project Learning Tree GreenWorks! grant!
Schoolyard Gardens
Check these web sites for lots of useful information about starting and maintaining a schoolyard garden.
Designing a School Garden
https://kidsgardening.org/designing-a-school-garden/
From Kids Gardening.org
As you design and your garden program and layout, consider these elements to ensure you meet the needs of your community..Green Thumb Challenge
http://www.greeneducationfoundation.org/greenthumbchallengesub.html
From the Green Education Foundation
The Green Education Foundation (GEF) provides gardening instructions; checklists for school approvals; plot location guidelines; container garden suggestions; funding resources; garden plans, vegetable and flower suggestions; and more. In addition, GEF is calling on schools and youth groups nationwide to plant 10,000 classroom and outdoor gardens – the largest youth gardening initiative in history!School Gardens
http://aggie-horticulture.tamu.edu/kindergarden/CHILD/SCHOOL/SGINTRO.HTM
From the Texas Agricultural Extension Service’s 4-H Association
This web site also offers advice and a step-by-step guide.
Creating Your Garden
Resources List for Beginning a Garden
For a pdf file with a list of resources for designing a garden, getting financial assistance, finding volunteers and more, CLICK HERE.
Ecoregional Planting Guides
https://www.pollinator.org/guides
From Pollinator Partnership
These ecoregional planting guides are tailored to specific areas of the U.S. Enter your zip code and you’ll get a 24-page pdf file with native planting information that will help you select plants for pollinators.Junior Master Gardener Program
http://www.jmgkids.us/
Junior Master Gardeners Program ignites a passion for learning, success and service through a unique gardening education. Curricula for Grades 3 – 5 and 6 – 8 are available.
Gardening for Pollinators
How-To: Bees
Enhancing Nest Sites for Native Bee Crop Pollinators
https://www.xerces.org/publications/periodicalsarticles/enhancing-nest-sites-for-native-bee-crop-pollinators
Learn how to provide nesting opportunities for native bees. Most native bees nest underground in areas that are sunny, well-drained, and either bare or partly vegetated. Alternatively, they nest in narrow tunnels in wood, or small cavities such as abandoned rodent nests.Improving Forage for Native Bee Crop Pollinators
https://www.xerces.org/publications/periodicalsarticles/improving-forage-for-native-bee-crop-pollinators
Provide habitat for bees, and they’ll increase the production of your garden!How-To: Butterflies
Monarch Watch’s Monarch Waystation Program
http://www.monarchwatch.org/waystations/
From Monarch Watch
To offset the loss of milkweed and nectar sources, Monarch Watch encourages people to create, conserve, and protect milkweed/monarch habitats. “Monarch Waystations” can be established in home gardens, at schools, businesses, parks, zoos, nature centers, along roadsides, and on other unused plots of land. Without a major effort to restore milkweeds to as many locations as possible, the monarch population is certain to decline to extremely low levels.How-To: Other Pollinators
More than 300 species of hummingbirds live in North, Central and South America. When a hummingbird extends its very long tongue deep into a flower to drink its nectar, pollen sticks to the hummingbird’s beak and head. Some of the pollen grains drop off when it visits other flowers, pollinating them.
Celebrating Wildflowers: Animal Pollination
https://www.fs.usda.gov/managing-land/wildflowers/pollinators
From the U.S. Forest Service
Animal pollinators play a crucial role in flowering plant reproduction and in the production of most fruits and vegetables. Most plants require the assistance of pollinators to produce seeds and fruit. About 80% of all flowering plants and over three-quarters of the staple crop plants that feed humankind rely on animal pollinators.How-To: Native Plants
Celebrate Wildflowers/Native Plant Materials
https://www.fs.usda.gov/wildflowers/Native_Plant_Materials/index.shtml
From the U.S. Forest Service
Native plants are valued for their economic, ecological, genetic, and aesthetic benefits in addition to their intrinsic value as living species. The use of native plant material (seeds, cuttings, plants) in vegetation projects plays an important role in the maintenance and restoration of native plant gene pools, communities, and ecosystems, and can help reverse the trend of species loss in North America.Native Plant Database
http://www.wildflower.org/plants/
From the Lady Bird Johnson Wildflower Center
This native plant database is an amazing resource about plants throughout the U.S. For any species, learn where it grows, when it’s blooming, color of its flowers, whether it need dry or moist soil, and much more!Plants Database
http://plants.usda.gov/java/
Look up most U.S. native flowering plants here. Search by common name or scientific name, see what they look like, and learn if they’ll grow in your area.How-To: Edible Gardens
Eat Healthy and Shop Smart
U.S. Department of Agriculture
https://snaped.fns.usda.gov/
From the U.S. Department of Agriculture
SNAP-Ed (Supplemental Nutrition Assistance Program Education) is the nutrition promotion and obesity prevention component of SNAP. Find lists for fruits and vegetables in season, low-cost recipes, and more.FoodData Central
From the US Department of Agriculture
https://fdc.nal.usda.gov/
FoodData Central takes the analysis, compilation, and presentation of nutrient and food component data to a new level.The People’s Garden: Growing Healthy Food, People and Communities
CLICK HERE for a brochure about the People’s Garden Initiative by the U.S. Department of Agriculture.
“’People’s Gardens’: USDA program focuses on creating public spaces to benefit communities”
CLICK HERE for an article about People’s Gardens, which have three main goals:- Benefit the community in multiple ways to include providing a public space for leisure activity, producing harvest for local food banks and creating a wildlife friendly environment.
- Be a collaborative between volunteers, neighbors and community organizations.
- Incorporate sustainable practices that nurture the environment.
How-To: Wildlife Gardens
Create a Certified Wildlife Habitat
From the National Wildlife Federation
https://www.nwf.org/Garden-for-Wildlife
Create sustainable garden that helps wildlife.
Anyone can create a welcoming haven for local wildlife. Turning your yard, balcony container garden, schoolyard, work landscape, or roadside greenspace into a Certified Wildlife Habitat® is fun, easy, and can make a lasting difference for wildlife.Gardening for Wildlife
http://www.nwf.org/Get-Outside/Be-Out-There/Educators/Schoolyard-Habitats/Create/~/media/PDFs/Eco-schools/SchoolyardHabitatsHowToGuide_Part2.ashx
From the National Wildlife Federation
Find practical and easy-to-us information on gardening for wildlife.How-To: Pollinator Friendly Practices
Celebrating Wildflowers
https://www.fs.usda.gov/wildflowers/pollinators/friendlypractices.shtml
From the U.S. Forest Service
Follow these simple steps to create a pollinator-friendly landscape around your home or workplace.
"Stung" by the Pollinator Bug
by Jessica Morrison, USDA Forest Service Intern Summer 2010
(Note: To watch a short video of Alison, watch Bees: Native and Honey above.)
Alison Fritz does not flinch as hundreds of bees furiously swarm around her in the sweltering heat. Safely clad in garments akin to something out of a science fiction novel, she comfortably slides open the lid of one of the three hives in her backyard. Fritz has been beekeeping for three years, and she is only 16 years old.
Having always been fascinated by insects, her unusual hobby was first sparked during a class about pollinators in the eighth grade.
“I’ve always liked insects. My dad taught me to pet bumblebees,” Fritz said. “When I began hearing about problems with the bee populations, I wanted to help.”The Agriculture Research Service of the U.S. Department of Agriculture (USDA) recently reported a drop in the number of managed bee colonies from 5 million 60 years ago to 2.5 million today. This mysterious decline in North American honey bees has come to be known as Colony Collapse Disorder (CCD). The underlying cause of CCD has yet to be determined, but factors such as pesticides, genetically modified crops, and cell phone radiation are some possible suspects.
Interested in this phenomenon, Alison Fritz immediately got in touch with Pat Haskell, mentor for the Beekeepers Association of Northern Virginia, who helped her to get started and set up an apiary. The rest just fell right into place. Today, she has been recognized as the youngest beekeeper in Washington D.C., a feat which has granted an honorable visit to the White House; as well as, the ability to be a mentor for younger students.
Her work has also caught the eye of the U.S. Forest Service, who recently filmed a segment on Fritz for its PollinatorLIVE program. The event, which is the successor to the department’s 2009 MonarchLIVE, aims to provide students and teachers with an interactive way to learn about pollinating insects.
In August, Fritz, who has studied Mandarin Chinese, will spend her upcoming junior year abroad in Beijing. In the People’s Republic where crops must be hand-pollinated by humans because of the disappearance of bees in many places, she hopes to continue learning and educating about the importance of beekeeping.
The bees are especially angry by the time she closes the lid. “When it’s hot,” she explained, “it’s also usually the season that the nectar flow diminishes. That, in addition to the heat, makes for a very stressful time for the bees.”
About one third of the food Americans’ consume is benefited by pollinators, the USDA says. Alison Fritz and PollinatorLIVE are prime examples of people and organizations working to educate the community of the honey bee’s vast importance on global food chains, and to inspire communities and classrooms to take action against its decline.
Standards addressed in this Video:
Social Studies Standards are educational guidelines outlining the essential knowledge, skills, and concepts students should learn in subjects such as history, geography, civics, and economics, aiming to provide a comprehensive understanding of societal structures, historical events, and global perspectives.-
Individuals, Groups, and Institutions
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People, Places, and Environments
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Production, Distribution, and Consumption
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Time, Continuity, and Change
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Here Come the Sunflowers!
Smithsonian Institution
Students will have an opportunity to learn about sunflowers and plant sunflower seeds, a native plant of the North American prairie.
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Moth Moonflower Pollination Game
Clemson University
In this activity, students will become hawkmoths and attempt to collect nectar and pollen from flowers while avoiding becoming prey to the predators lurking in the garden. They will investigate the proboscis of the moth as an adaptation allowing it to feed and survive. They also will investigate ways living things interact with each other in the nocturnal garden.
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Sowing Seed of Learning: Establishing and Using Outdoor Classrooms for K-5 Science Education
Prince William County (Virginia) Public Schools
This curriculum provides lessons to engage students in meaningful outdoor experiences that meet education standards. Research has shown that well-executed outdoor education raises student achievement in all content areas, enhances character development, reduces disciplinary problems, and improves student attendance. An outdoor classroom, also sometimes referred to as a schoolyard habitat or community restoration project, is a space set aside for the development of natural habitats in which students and community members can learn about science and the outdoors through a hands on experience. Although most of what is done in an outdoor classroom relates to science, it is also an interactive opportunity for students to learn about math, language arts, social studies, art, and music.
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Exploring the Native Plant World (Grades 3 - 4)
Lady Bird Johnson Wildflower Center
In this unit of Exploring the Native Plant World, students build on their knowledge of what plants must do to survive. Plants need certain ingredients to make food, and they need their friends and partners. Plants have evolved ways to defend themselves, strategies to ensure the survival and continuation of their species, and ways to fit into their habitats. This curriculum has five lesson plans and 25 activities.
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Pollination Parade
Project Seasons, Shelburne Farms
Students explore the relationship between plants and their pollinators. As an extension, have students conduct a pollination survey observing a flower over time noting the different types of pollinators and behavior of pollinators that visit it.
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Plants and Animals: Partners in Pollination
Plants and Animals: Partners in Pollination
Smithsonian Center for Education and Museum StudiesUltimately, all life on Earth depends on plants to provide food, shelter, and oxygen for other living things. Consequently, plant reproduction is crucial to all other life on this planet. The first step in plant reproduction is the intricate process called pollination, which occurs when pollen grains, the male germ cell of a plant, reach the stigma, the female reproductive part of the same species of plant. Depending on the plant species, a flower can produce male, female, or both structures. Pollination can also occur within the same flower.
Most flowering plants (90 percent) depend on animals to make the vital pollen-grain delivery. The remaining flowering plants rely on wind and some-times splashing raindrops to ferry pollen, but this is a less precise method. Pollinating animals do the job for a reward: food, usually in the form of nectar.
- Lesson Plan 1 – objectives include: identifying the plant parts involved in reproduction; identifing the animal (bee) structures involved in pollination; and demonstrating how pollen moves from the male stamen to the female stigma.
- Lesson Plan 2 – objectives include interpreting the links between pollination and food production.
- Lesson Plan 3 -objectives include describing the complementary relationships between pollinators and the plants they pollinate and identifying adaptations that flowers have developed to “encourage” pollination.
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The Blossoming of Flower Power
New York Times
In this lesson, students explore the reproductive functions of flowers by participating in a flower dissection lab.
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Ag Pollinators
There is an excellent list of education resources about pollinators.
Lesson Plans
Grades PreK-3
Grades 1 – 6
Grades 3 – 6
Grades 3 – 8
Grades 6 – 8
Other Lesson Plans
Glossary
View All GlossaryGoals and Objectives
The goal of PollinatorLIVE: A Distance Learning Adventure is to meet national science education standards and promote conservation action through education and awareness. The objectives are as follows:
- Increase understanding of pollinators and their importance.
- Understand the partnership between plants and pollinators.
- Understand the characteristics of pollinators that make them uniquely suited to the task of pollination.
- Encourage schools and classrooms to take action to help pollinators by developing pollinator gardens and schoolyard habitats.
- Increase participation in and understanding of citizen science programs related to plants and their pollination.
- Learn the importance of being a good steward.
- Understand the role of citizens, public land management agencies, and non-governmental organizations in protecting and conserving habitat.
Pollinator Overview
Many people think only of allergies when they hear the word pollen. But pollination — the transfer of pollen grains to fertilize the seed-producing ovaries of flowers — is an essential part of a healthy ecosystem. Pollinators play a significant role in the production of over 150 food crops in the United States — among them apples, alfalfa, almonds, blueberries, cranberries, kiwis, melons, pears, plums, and squash.
Bees, both managed honey bees and native bees, are the primary pollinators. In the United States, the annual benefit of managed honey bees to consumers is estimated at $14.6 billion. The services provided by native pollinators further contribute to the productivity of crops as well as to the survival and reproduction of many native plants.
However, more than 100,000 invertebrate species, including bees, moths, butterflies, beetles, flies, hummingbirds, ants, and wasps serve as pollinators — as well as 1,035 species of vertebrates, including birds, mammals, and reptiles.
Bats play a key role in many ecosystems. They pollinate the fragrant, white or pale flowers that bloom and night and disperse the seeds of more than 300 plant species. Can you imagine life without cashews, mangos, carob, dates, figs, papaya, guava and cloves? These are a few of the many plants which depend on bats for their survival.
Bats, hummingbirds, ants, beetles, wasps, butterflies, moths, flies and even lizards are “busy as bees” each spring and summer pollinating flowers.
Did you know that some of the world’s top pollinators are flies? Long-tongue flies, gnats, and yes, even male mosquitoes! Some male mosquitoes help to pollinate rare orchids; the pollen grains actually stick to their eyes as they travel from flower to flower. When they dip their proboscis (mouth tube) into the flower to take a sip of nectar, the pollen grains mix and pollination takes place.
A lot of pollinating flies, like hover flies and bee flies, disguise themselves as bees or wasps. Flies use this mimicry to protect themselves against predators. If an insect looks like it might sting, a predator might not try to eat it. How can you tell the difference between a honeybee and a bee fly? Check out the wings. If the insect has one pair of wings, it’s a fly. Two pairs? A bee.
Despite the valuable services that pollinators provide, long-term population trends for some North American pollinators are “demonstrably downward,” says a new report from the National Research Council1.
Observable decreases in wild populations of bees, butterflies, and moths are of great concern to producers of fruits, vegetables, nuts, alfalfa, and flowers. These crops depend on wild and domestic pollinators. Growers in California, Florida, Arizona, Utah, Washington, and Hawaii are especially concerned. More important is the disturbing notion of an imbalance in the natural ecosystem and biodiversity on which all food production depends. Habitat loss for pollinators by human activity poses an immediate and frequently irreversible threat. Other factors responsible for population decreases include invasive plant species, broad-spectrum pesticide use, disease, and weather.
For the most part, the general public is unaware of the decrease in pollinator populations and the implications this has for agricultural production.“Status of Pollinators in North America, ” Committee on the Status of Pollinators in North America, National Research Council
Gardening
Grants
Congratulations to the following schools and organizations that received GreenWorks! grants from Project Learning Tree and the USDA Forest Service to create gardens for pollinators in their schoolyards and communities. These merit-based grants were awarded to students and teachers participating in PollinatorLIVE: A Distance Learning Adventure.
State City School/Organization Project Name & Description AL Birmingham Cawaco RC&D Council, Horticultural Therapy Program PLANT PROJECT™: Pairs special-needs children at Clay-Chalkville School with adults in senior/assisted living facilities to develop a pollinator garden. The garden will also serve as an outdoor classroom for the school. AR Pea Ridge Pea Ridge School District Rain and Pollinator Garden: Seventh-grade students will create the garden, to be used as an outdoor learning space and also to help a part of the school grounds that experiences drainage problems. CA Newbury Park EARTHS Magnet School EARTHS Community Garden: Students at this K-5 magnet school will design plant and maintain the garden, which will include a native pollinator labyrinth. CA Auburn Placer Nature Center Native Bee Sanctuaries: The nature center will involve families and youth, preschool through college, in creating native bee sanctuaries. CA Torrance West High School Native Plant Garden: AP Biology and AP Environmental Science students will study California native plants and then design, prepare and plant a native plant garden on campus. GA Stone Mountain Stone Mountain Elementary The Phoenix Project: Led by the GEN Club, students will replace and refurbish gardens destroyed by the drought of 2010, including a pollinator garden in front of the school HI Anahola Kanuikapono New Century Public Charter School Busy Bees Native Pollinator Garden: Students K-12 will expand the school’s indigenous plants garden and establish a beehive lab. ID Moscow University of Idaho Women in Science Stateline Wetlands Pollinator Garden: Students, K-16, will create two pollinator gardens at either end of the eight-acre Stateline Wetland. KS Melvern Marais Des Cygnes Valley High School Melvern Riverfront Park and Trails Pollinator Garden: Students will develop the garden at a park next to their school. They will collect data about it through Project Bud Burst and PollinatorLIVE in spring and fall. MI Owosso DeVries Nature Conservancy Pollinator Buffer Garden: Homeschooled and Youth Advisory Council students will plan, create and maintain the garden, using native MI genotypes, next to an heirloom vegetable patch on the grounds of the Conservancy. MN Buffalo Wright Technical Center/Wright Learning Center WTC/WLC Land Restoration Project: Students will restore a 5.2 acre section of the school grounds with native species to increase biodiversity. It will be an outdoor classroom and center for eight cooperative school districts and the surrounding community. NJ Livingston Joseph Kushner Hebrew Academy/Sinai School for Special Needs Gen Tikvah/Garden of Hope: Students, preK-12, will renew a neglected garden, and also relate it to “I Never Saw Another Butterfly,” written by a child during the Holocaust. NJ Little Egg Harbor Little Egg Harbor School District Egg Garden: Frog Pond School will create a garden with pollinating plants alongside a pond. They will also involve Boy Scouts and seniors. NM Tijeras Talking Talons Youth Leadership Bees-2-Please: Youth and the Route 66 Community Garden Club will create a community pollinator garden, which will also have interpretive signs for the public. NV Reno Urban Roots Garden Classroom Pollinate for a Better State: Reno-area schools will develop a native garden at the Urban Roots farm. They will also use the garden to focus on the role of native ecology in the health of the state. NY Brooklyn Compost for Brooklyn Bug Land Builders: Students at PS 213 Brooklyn Dreams Charter School, a preschool, and other groups will start seeds indoors, then transplant to a pollinator garden on the site of Compost for Brooklyn. OH North Lima Goodness Grows Bloomin’ Butterfly Garden: Columbiana High School special needs students will design and build a butterfly garden at Goodness Grows, a nonprofit center near Youngstown. OH Burton Berkshire High School Public Schools and Pollinators!: Students will take the lead in developing a pollinator garden as a solution to excess water run-off. An important component is to invite members of the community so they see the connection between academic learning and community service. OR Gresham Pleasant Valley School The Birds and The Bees: Students K-6 will research, plan, and plant a pollinator hedgerow and develop signage, which will go along the playground bordering a meadow. This is part of a restoration project in which students have planted 3,000 native trees and shrubs over the past four years. PA Ulysses Northern Potter School District Cold Climate Pollinator Gardening in the Headwaters of Pennsylvania: K-12 students will develop a plant community that supports pollinators, provides a science-based curriculum of four-season gardening in a cold climate, and becomes a community focal point. TN Murfreesboro Murfreesboro Parks and Recreation, and City Schools F.U.N. (Families Understanding Nature/Nutrition): As a way to reduce the childhood nature deficit, reduce childhood obesity, and increase physical activity, students will develop outdoor classrooms and habitats at two sites. TX Friendswood Brookside Intermediate School Pollinators Aplenty: Middle school students will develop a garden that focuses on the need for pollinators and their contribution to food and seed production. TX Nacogdoches Friends of the National Forests and Grasslands of Texas, Latino Legacy, Amigos del Bosque Ninos del Jardin: Fourth and fifth graders will be involved in a collaborative effort to create two community gardens with plants for pollinators: one at Thomas J Rusk Elementary and one at a demonstration garden nearby. VA Manassas Ashland Elementary PTO Earth Day Garden: Create an outdoor learning laboratory to support the science curriculum of each grade level, including a pollinator garden, with a butterfly house and a bat house planned. VA Bluemont Village Montessori School at Bluemont Village of Pollen: Students will develop the garden habitat in a meadow setting, with additional plantings in woodlands and pond-side. They will create signage and lead tours. VA Manassas New Dominion Alternative Education Center and Prince William County Schools Science Office Exploring Nature’s Beauty Garden: Students will create a pollinator garden, and teachers will use it to conduct authentic, hands-on exploration. WI Green Bay Howard-Suamico School District: Students Achieving in Life Alternative Program Hope Grows Garden: Students, grades 7-12, will develop a garden with the assistance of community volunteers and district staff. Vegetables grown will be donated to an area food pantry. WI Madison Goodman Community Center Honey Bees and Butterflies at Goodman: Students will develop a garden, butterfly houses, and beehive near an existing large community garden. Students in the center’s grounds and maintenance program will have primary responsibility. Additional Grants
A number of other organizations provide funding for schoolyard or community gardens.
Kids Gardening
https://kidsgardening.org/garden-grants/
Kids Gardening / National Gardening Association offer grants and list other organizations that do as well.Project Learning Tree
https://www.plt.org/apply-for-greenworks-environmental-education-grant
Do you have an idea for a school/community native plant garden, a forest improvement project, a streamside restoration plan, a recycling program, or energy conservation project for your students? Need funds to implement it? Apply for a Project Learning Tree GreenWorks! grant!
Schoolyard Gardens
Check these web sites for lots of useful information about starting and maintaining a schoolyard garden.
Designing a School Garden
https://kidsgardening.org/designing-a-school-garden/
From Kids Gardening.org
As you design and your garden program and layout, consider these elements to ensure you meet the needs of your community..Green Thumb Challenge
http://www.greeneducationfoundation.org/greenthumbchallengesub.html
From the Green Education Foundation
The Green Education Foundation (GEF) provides gardening instructions; checklists for school approvals; plot location guidelines; container garden suggestions; funding resources; garden plans, vegetable and flower suggestions; and more. In addition, GEF is calling on schools and youth groups nationwide to plant 10,000 classroom and outdoor gardens – the largest youth gardening initiative in history!School Gardens
http://aggie-horticulture.tamu.edu/kindergarden/CHILD/SCHOOL/SGINTRO.HTM
From the Texas Agricultural Extension Service’s 4-H Association
This web site also offers advice and a step-by-step guide.
Creating Your Garden
Resources List for Beginning a Garden
For a pdf file with a list of resources for designing a garden, getting financial assistance, finding volunteers and more, CLICK HERE.Ecoregional Planting Guides
https://www.pollinator.org/guides
From Pollinator Partnership
These ecoregional planting guides are tailored to specific areas of the U.S. Enter your zip code and you’ll get a 24-page pdf file with native planting information that will help you select plants for pollinators.Junior Master Gardener Program
http://www.jmgkids.us/
Junior Master Gardeners Program ignites a passion for learning, success and service through a unique gardening education. Curricula for Grades 3 – 5 and 6 – 8 are available.
Gardening for Pollinators
How-To: Bees
Enhancing Nest Sites for Native Bee Crop Pollinators
https://www.xerces.org/publications/periodicalsarticles/enhancing-nest-sites-for-native-bee-crop-pollinators
Learn how to provide nesting opportunities for native bees. Most native bees nest underground in areas that are sunny, well-drained, and either bare or partly vegetated. Alternatively, they nest in narrow tunnels in wood, or small cavities such as abandoned rodent nests.Improving Forage for Native Bee Crop Pollinators
https://www.xerces.org/publications/periodicalsarticles/improving-forage-for-native-bee-crop-pollinators
Provide habitat for bees, and they’ll increase the production of your garden!How-To: Butterflies
Monarch Watch’s Monarch Waystation Program
http://www.monarchwatch.org/waystations/
From Monarch Watch
To offset the loss of milkweed and nectar sources, Monarch Watch encourages people to create, conserve, and protect milkweed/monarch habitats. “Monarch Waystations” can be established in home gardens, at schools, businesses, parks, zoos, nature centers, along roadsides, and on other unused plots of land. Without a major effort to restore milkweeds to as many locations as possible, the monarch population is certain to decline to extremely low levels.How-To: Other Pollinators
More than 300 species of hummingbirds live in North, Central and South America. When a hummingbird extends its very long tongue deep into a flower to drink its nectar, pollen sticks to the hummingbird’s beak and head. Some of the pollen grains drop off when it visits other flowers, pollinating them.
Celebrating Wildflowers: Animal Pollination
https://www.fs.usda.gov/managing-land/wildflowers/pollinators
From the U.S. Forest Service
Animal pollinators play a crucial role in flowering plant reproduction and in the production of most fruits and vegetables. Most plants require the assistance of pollinators to produce seeds and fruit. About 80% of all flowering plants and over three-quarters of the staple crop plants that feed humankind rely on animal pollinators.How-To: Native Plants
Celebrate Wildflowers/Native Plant Materials
https://www.fs.usda.gov/wildflowers/Native_Plant_Materials/index.shtml
From the U.S. Forest Service
Native plants are valued for their economic, ecological, genetic, and aesthetic benefits in addition to their intrinsic value as living species. The use of native plant material (seeds, cuttings, plants) in vegetation projects plays an important role in the maintenance and restoration of native plant gene pools, communities, and ecosystems, and can help reverse the trend of species loss in North America.Native Plant Database
http://www.wildflower.org/plants/
From the Lady Bird Johnson Wildflower Center
This native plant database is an amazing resource about plants throughout the U.S. For any species, learn where it grows, when it’s blooming, color of its flowers, whether it need dry or moist soil, and much more!Plants Database
http://plants.usda.gov/java/
Look up most U.S. native flowering plants here. Search by common name or scientific name, see what they look like, and learn if they’ll grow in your area.How-To: Edible Gardens
Eat Healthy and Shop Smart
U.S. Department of Agriculture
https://snaped.fns.usda.gov/
From the U.S. Department of Agriculture
SNAP-Ed (Supplemental Nutrition Assistance Program Education) is the nutrition promotion and obesity prevention component of SNAP. Find lists for fruits and vegetables in season, low-cost recipes, and more.FoodData Central
From the US Department of Agriculture
https://fdc.nal.usda.gov/
FoodData Central takes the analysis, compilation, and presentation of nutrient and food component data to a new level.The People’s Garden: Growing Healthy Food, People and Communities
CLICK HERE for a brochure about the People’s Garden Initiative by the U.S. Department of Agriculture.
“’People’s Gardens’: USDA program focuses on creating public spaces to benefit communities”
CLICK HERE for an article about People’s Gardens, which have three main goals:- Benefit the community in multiple ways to include providing a public space for leisure activity, producing harvest for local food banks and creating a wildlife friendly environment.
- Be a collaborative between volunteers, neighbors and community organizations.
- Incorporate sustainable practices that nurture the environment.
How-To: Wildlife Gardens
Create a Certified Wildlife Habitat
From the National Wildlife Federation
https://www.nwf.org/Garden-for-Wildlife
Create sustainable garden that helps wildlife.
Anyone can create a welcoming haven for local wildlife. Turning your yard, balcony container garden, schoolyard, work landscape, or roadside greenspace into a Certified Wildlife Habitat® is fun, easy, and can make a lasting difference for wildlife.Gardening for Wildlife
http://www.nwf.org/Get-Outside/Be-Out-There/Educators/Schoolyard-Habitats/Create/~/media/PDFs/Eco-schools/SchoolyardHabitatsHowToGuide_Part2.ashx
From the National Wildlife Federation
Find practical and easy-to-us information on gardening for wildlife.How-To: Pollinator Friendly Practices
Celebrating Wildflowers
https://www.fs.usda.gov/wildflowers/pollinators/friendlypractices.shtml
From the U.S. Forest Service
Follow these simple steps to create a pollinator-friendly landscape around your home or workplace.
"Stung" by the Pollinator Bug
by Jessica Morrison, USDA Forest Service Intern Summer 2010
(Note: To watch a short video of Alison, watch Bees: Native and Honey above.)
Alison Fritz does not flinch as hundreds of bees furiously swarm around her in the sweltering heat. Safely clad in garments akin to something out of a science fiction novel, she comfortably slides open the lid of one of the three hives in her backyard. Fritz has been beekeeping for three years, and she is only 16 years old.
Having always been fascinated by insects, her unusual hobby was first sparked during a class about pollinators in the eighth grade.
“I’ve always liked insects. My dad taught me to pet bumblebees,” Fritz said. “When I began hearing about problems with the bee populations, I wanted to help.”The Agriculture Research Service of the U.S. Department of Agriculture (USDA) recently reported a drop in the number of managed bee colonies from 5 million 60 years ago to 2.5 million today. This mysterious decline in North American honey bees has come to be known as Colony Collapse Disorder (CCD). The underlying cause of CCD has yet to be determined, but factors such as pesticides, genetically modified crops, and cell phone radiation are some possible suspects.
Interested in this phenomenon, Alison Fritz immediately got in touch with Pat Haskell, mentor for the Beekeepers Association of Northern Virginia, who helped her to get started and set up an apiary. The rest just fell right into place. Today, she has been recognized as the youngest beekeeper in Washington D.C., a feat which has granted an honorable visit to the White House; as well as, the ability to be a mentor for younger students.
Her work has also caught the eye of the U.S. Forest Service, who recently filmed a segment on Fritz for its PollinatorLIVE program. The event, which is the successor to the department’s 2009 MonarchLIVE, aims to provide students and teachers with an interactive way to learn about pollinating insects.
In August, Fritz, who has studied Mandarin Chinese, will spend her upcoming junior year abroad in Beijing. In the People’s Republic where crops must be hand-pollinated by humans because of the disappearance of bees in many places, she hopes to continue learning and educating about the importance of beekeeping.
The bees are especially angry by the time she closes the lid. “When it’s hot,” she explained, “it’s also usually the season that the nectar flow diminishes. That, in addition to the heat, makes for a very stressful time for the bees.”
About one third of the food Americans’ consume is benefited by pollinators, the USDA says. Alison Fritz and PollinatorLIVE are prime examples of people and organizations working to educate the community of the honey bee’s vast importance on global food chains, and to inspire communities and classrooms to take action against its decline.
Project Lead Partners
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USDA Forest Service - Conservation Education
The USDA. Forest Service serves as the lead governmental agency for Pollinator LIVE. The Conservation Education program (CE) helps people of all ages understand and appreciate our country's natural resources – and learn how to conserve those resources for future generations. Through structured educational experiences and activities targeted to varying age groups and populations, conservation education enables people to realize how natural resources and ecosystems affect each other and how resources can be used wisely
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National Environmental Education Foundation
Chartered by Congress in 1990 to advance environmental knowledge and action, our ultimate goal is to activate environmentally responsible behavior in the general public. The National Environmental Education Act of 1990 established the National Environmental Education Foundation as a complementary organization to the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency (EPA), extending its ability to foster environmental literacy in all segments of the American public as well as leveraging private funds.
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U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service – National Conservation Training Center
The mission of the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service is working with others to conserve, protect, and enhance fish, wildlife, plants, and their habitats for the continuing benefit of the American people. The National Conservation Training Center in West Virginia offers provides national training, program coordination, technical support, and distance learning for conservation professionals.
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Other Partners
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Project Learning Tree
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American Public Gardens Association
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Discover Life and Bee Hunt!
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Lady Bird Johnson Wildflower Center, The University of Texas at Austin
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Monarch Watch, University of Kansas
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National Garden Clubs, Inc.
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National Science Teachers Association
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National Wildlife Federation
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North American Pollinator Protection Campaign/Pollinator Partnership
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Prince William County Public Schools
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Smithsonian National Museum of Natural History
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Smithsonian National Zoological Park
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USDA National Institute of Food and Agriculture
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USDA Natural Resources Conservation Service
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Wildlife Habitat Council
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