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Pollinator-Friendly Native Plant Lists
- rhn_mk1 7y agoOnly talks about North America.
- herodotus 7y agoThere are links to sites for several other countries
- wlll 7y agoIt really bugs me when people put stuff on the Internet like this, an International network of often English speaking people many of whom don't live in the USA. It happens all the time. "Series X to be releaesd next month", "Hardware y to be releaesd on Monday", as if they have suddenly forgotten that there's an entire rest of the world who may be reading this.
- TeMPOraL 7y agoIt gets worse - "X to be released this fall". When exactly?
- lostlogin 7y agoAre there many places outside the US that use ‘fall’ over ‘autumn’?
- deepnet 7y agohttps://www.rhs.org.uk/science/conservation-biodiversity/wildlife/plants-for-pollinators https://www.rhs.org.uk/science/conservation-biodiversity/wil... Royal Horticultural Society UK Garden & Wild plants for pollinators by month.
- pvaldes 7y agoVery pleasant to see, elegant and informative Extra point for writing Symphyotrichum instead Aster. This means that there is a serious taxonomic work in the background (and they cared to update the scientific names and include the modern changes based in DNA studies). The title could benefit of an "in North America"
- Zenst 7y agoAnything that flowers produces pollen right - so hmm. However, I always like to have a patch of wild flowers (localy sourced previous year for seed) in along with chives and lavander. Look nice and just before the lockdown I went out and sowed some in a few spots along with some sunflowers. Logic being that they will bloom around the time everybody really down from the lockdown and help chirp up people, also good for nature and birds love sunflower seed. Which is one thing I feed them regularly with my window feeder and been a joy over the past few weeks and months ahead. You can make a window bird feeder with some perspex or even cut and glue up some milk containers - few suction cups and tada, simple and effective little bird feeder and they do use them and who needs 4k/8k.. when you have real life out a window comming to you. Highly recommended.
- patall 7y ago> Anything that flowers produces pollen right - so hmm. Technically, that may be right but is beyond the point. Very often, for alien species the local pollinators will not recognize the plant as such and thus ignore it. A prime example for this is Forsythia that a lot of people in my area plant because its one of the first flowering trees in the year. However, from an ecological standpoint it is worthless and for some insects even suspected to be toxic. Another problem are breeds where the blossom is filled with extra petals. While this may look nice to us, it makes the pollen and nectar inaccessible to many insects. As they are still drawn to the flower but cannot reach it, its also net negative for those critters.
- Zenst 7y agoFascinating, I did not know that, do now - thank you. I use local wildflower seed harvested from walks the previous year, though mostly from previous years sowings now as got some momentum going.
- pvaldes 7y ago> Anything that flowers produces pollen right - so hmm. Yes, but not all pollens are designed to feed insects. Yews or Cypresses release huge amounts of pollen that will paint a car in yellow, but will not attract pollinators.
- kidkong 7y agoPollinator-Friendly Native Plant Lists in the USA, there FTFY.
- athenot 7y agoThis is well put together. The PDF has a single page ordered by bloom time within the season. For each plant, it lists the water requirements and rough height: this quickly lets me know whether a plant will fit in a particular location in my yard. Otherwise I go looking for plants, find what seems to be nice then after digging up the details find out it doesn't match the location. These PDFs are sorted by US region but for those outside the US, this may still be useful if your local climate happens to be close to one of the 10 listed here.
- 0xddd 7y ago> These PDFs are sorted by US region but for those outside the US, this may still be useful if your local climate happens to be close to one of the 10 listed here. Possibly, but seems like it would still be best to determine what's native for your region, not just plant something because it can survive.
- deleted 7y ago[deleted]
- willvarfar 7y agoGorgeous PDFs! Very informative and easy to read too. I wish there was a similar thing for my country far away. If there is, I'm missing it. Most books about 'native' plants are about wild flowers, and most books about garden plants don't say what is native and are full of types which clearly aren't. And yeah, I've planted a lot of buddleia, which I've since learned is an invasive species where I am.
- memco 7y agoVery cool! The numbering in the bloom periods for California [0] is missing 17-20: it goes "16, 21, 22, 23 … 24". The pictures look to be numbered correctly though. [0]: https://xerces.org/sites/default/files/2018-05/17-045_02_XercesSoc_Pollinator-Plants_California_web-3page.pdf https://xerces.org/sites/default/files/2018-05/17-045_02_Xer...
- wil421 7y agoThey have California, Florida, and the rest are just regional pamphlets.
- goda90 7y agoCalifornia is big enough and isolated enough by mountains to be considered a distinct region. Florida is different enough to be considered distinct from the rest of the south. Nature doesn't care about state borders. Regional pamphlets make sense.
- SamWhited 7y agoThis is a great resource if you're in the U.S., thank you! Be sure to look up your local native plant societies if you need more help, they're a great resource and can often find you cheap seeds or young plants. In Georgia we have the Georgia Native Plant Society (https://gnps.org/ https://gnps.org/) and in Texas the Lady Bird Johnson Wildflower Center can help you (https://www.wildflower.org/ https://www.wildflower.org/). Find and support your local native plant people!
- gumby 7y agoI had native plants in the gardens of my house I listed for sale (before things ground to a halt, alas). The real estate agents wanted then all replaced by "more attractive" plants that need more water. Sigh.
- Zenst 7y agoYou don't have to follow their `advice`, and most who want such plants would plant the ones they want anyhow and those who like native plants would be a plus point sales wise. So you may find the effort and expense would not yield much of a return and may be detrimental profit wise. Saying that as I'm not aware of anybody who was put off a house sale as they didn't like the plants, though aware of many who would landscape/redo the garden to their taste irrespective of what's there and the only thing that may have merit would be a tree or bushes that would factor in some buyers, not the plants. Unless of course it's something like knotweed. Did you consult with other agents?
- gumby 7y agoYes interviewed several. The thing about the Californian plants is that they are very low water users, but as a result the plants look patchy and so, to those with a European or Asian conception of what "plants" should look like, can appear a bit bedraggled. It's all about people imagining themselves in the house.
- anonAndOn 7y agoFWIW, adding some hardscaping (rocks, boulders, cement pavers) and vertical changes (dry creek, small hills with dirt from the dry creek) made my xeriscape look 100x more interesting. There's a sweat equity cost and hardscaping can get expensive quickly, but your payoff is likely a big increase in curb appeal.
- Zenst 7y agoThat is some solid advice, large stone's will shield and help reduce evaporation as well. Though way things are going, the whole housing market is getting put on pause, bit by bit and at least in the UK - mortgage lenders are withdrawing loan deals and now only doing mortgages with min 25% equity/deposit. https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/business-52106119 https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/business-52106119 So it does seem like even if there isn't some housing crash/slide, the banks are ontrack to induce one. Hence your advice, might well be a case of having the time and as you say the curb factor to get it thru. Personally, I dunno if i'd look at a quick sale for lesser or hold out, certainly some interesting times we live in.
- esemor 7y agoLooking for similar resources for Europe in general and Scandinavia in particular. Anyone know of something similar?
- pvaldes 7y agoSalix can be a start. You have several dwarf or small species. Salix lanata for example. Rhododendron tomentosum also Describe your location. What kind of garden do you want to create?
- adrr 7y agoDoes North America have that many pollinator insects in terms of population? We have some butterflies and some solitary bees. We don't have the honey bee. What would normally be pollinating these plants, all I see is honey bees and some butterflies.
- ozborn 7y agoI'm not sure about number of pollinator insects in terms of population, but in the southeast for example, the southeastern blueberry bee (https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Habropoda_laboriosa https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Habropoda_laboriosa) pollinates blueberries through buzz pollination. I believe even commercial blueberry operations rely on this pollinator, as blueberries are native to North America and those bees are its primary pollinators.
- throwanem 7y agoWasps are pollinators, too. Many, especially among the prolific polistids, are obligate nectar feeders as adults, hunting only to feed or otherwise provision their larvae. Their typically scanty pubescence makes them less efficient pollinators than bees when taken one by each, but in the aggregate they're critical nonetheless.
- keithly 7y agoThere are some links for other countries under "Additional Resources" at the bottom of the page.
- carapace 7y agoNot to be "that guy" but I have to point out that, while this is great, the primary threat to pollinators is our modern mass agriculture.
- goda90 7y agoReplacing monoculture, pesticide ridden lawns with more natural coverings(especially in places where no one is even using the lawn for recreation) is a good first step. Then at least the cities and suburbs can be a haven. It also gets people thinking about this kind of stuff and can lead to pressure for more sustainable agriculture.
- carapace 7y agoOh absolutely! Have you heard of "Integral Urban House"? https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Integral_Urban_House https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Integral_Urban_House
- ageofwant 7y agoMost countries have online flora's and at lasses like https://www.ala.org.au/ https://www.ala.org.au/ (Atlas of live Australia). What is often missing is nice presentations and use case specific applications like this.
- contingencies 7y agoIf you are in to plants, I can strongly recommend installing the http://inaturalist.org/ http://inaturalist.org/ app. Great community any ML based identifications, providing open citizen science data to researchers and objective collated data such as range, seasonality, etc. per species. Australia: Shots of ants pollinating a native tea tree I took recently: https://www.inaturalist.org/observations/40225415 https://www.inaturalist.org/observations/40225415 + somewhat dated but broad scientific review of Australian pollinators: https://moscow.sci-hub.tw/3455/c6d90a9c9485aa772e97f4c6932cc084/armstrong1979.pdf https://moscow.sci-hub.tw/3455/c6d90a9c9485aa772e97f4c6932cc... + upcoming April 12-19 wild pollinator count event https://wildpollinatorcount.com/ https://wildpollinatorcount.com/
- sixstringtheory 7y agoHere's another resource from the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service, which includes a couple places not found in the linked site: https://www.fws.gov/pollinators/ https://www.fws.gov/pollinators/
- 3fe9a03ccd14ca5 7y agoI've had a lot of fun this year keeping mason bees (native bees). They're solitary and extremely docile (I've messed with their comb homes a lot and they've never minded). They're also extremely good pollinators, much better than honey bees. After an unsuccessful attempt to use a mason bee hive from Costco, I ripped it out and inserted 3D printed equivalents, which they seem to be more interested in. It's also fun that I get to disassemble the nest and double my brood for next year. As for the garden, it's hard to determine causation, but I've noticed a much better yield on my stone fruits. I highly recommend mason bees in your garden next year. They're easy, low maintenance, and kids can get into keeping them.
- ourmandave 7y agoHope they include milkweed on the lists for endangered Monarchs. https://monarchbutterflygarden.net/how-to-start-monarch-butterfly-garden/ https://monarchbutterflygarden.net/how-to-start-monarch-butt...