Keeping Count of Pollinators

 

The Great Pollinator Count (Community Science Counts!) 

by Susan Edwards Richmond; illus. by Stephanie Fizer Coleman 

32 pages; ages 4-8

Margaret Quinlin Books/Peachtree, 2025

One of the things I do every summer is count pollinators for the Great Sunflower Project, a community science project that I’ve been participating in since … oh, my - 2009! So I was really, really looking forward to Susan Richmond’s newest book about pollinator counts, and she doesn’t disappoint.

Mellie and her friends are part of a science club and they’re planning to count pollinators. The science club advisor, aptly named Ms. Bombus (awesome nod to buzzy sounds and bumblebees!) pairs Mellie with a kid who loves dinosaurs and hates stinging insects. As they count, readers are introduced to honeybees and small bees, carpenter bees and bumblebees, flies and wasps and even a hummingbird moth. Back matter highlights the insects in the book and lists the flowers in the school’s pollinator garden.

Back around Earth Day, Susan joined a bunch of us for “The Fifth Annual GROG Arthropod Roundtable” where we chatted about bugs we love (and those we don’t). She talked a bit about why she wrote The Great Pollinator Count.

“Young children are eager to explore their environment and are natural scientists,” she said, adding that many children (and adults) are afraid of bees and wasps. While respect and caution are a healthy response towards stinging insects, Susan wanted folks to appreciate all pollinators, not just the butterflies. A perfect reason for writing a book … but what’s the hook?

“When I learned that Georgia conducted an annual insect pollinator census, which includes schoolchildren, I knew this would be my gateway!” What better than a pollinator count! Pollinator counts are becoming more common, and what began as a Georgia community science project, The Great Southeast Pollinator Census has now expanded to include four more states: North and South Carolina, Florida, and Alabama. 

“May this notion of promoting a healthy pollinator population continue to grow!” Susan says.     

Pollinator Week Activity: visit a flowery meadow or a garden and count the pollinators you see in 10 minutes.

Susan is a member of #STEAMTeam2025. You can find out more about her at her website at www.susanedwardsrichmond.com  

Pollinators are Very Buzzy!

 

The Buzz on Wild Bees: The Little-Known Pollinators that Keep Our Planet Humming 

by Kira Vermond; illust. by June Steube

40 pages; ages 7-10

‎ Owlkids, 2025  

Do you know what bees look like? It’s OK if you don’t. There are more than 20,000 different species of bees on our planet, and most people can only identify a honeybee. This book introduces different kinds of wild bees: leafcutters, oil-collecting bees, cellophane bees, sweat bees and vulture bees and even bees that scrape the fuzz off plants and rolls it up like fluffy wool. It also shows the sorts of places wild bees live, and discusses why they’re so important to the other plants and animals in the environment (including humans).

But … wild bees are in danger and need our help. So this book shares a bunch of ways we can help them thrive, from planting native flowers to ditching pesticides. 

Pollinator Week Activity: Create a wild patch for wild bees! Get permission to let part of your yard go wild and weedy for a month (or the summer!). All you need to do is make sure no one mows that patch. Document the flowers and wild bees that you see in your wild flower patch. Ways to document: draw, paint, photograph, write notes about, write haiku or poetry.  

Explore Outdoors ~ Contrasting colors

One of the things that attracts me to gardens is color. Bees are attracted by color, too! They appreciate yellow and orange and blue and purple flowers. So whenever I walk by a garden, I take a peek at who's visiting the blossoms. This time I was rewarded with a contrast in colors: the bright green of the bee against the brilliant purple of the coneflower.

 

 

This week as you walk by gardens, look for contrasting colors. It might be a brilliant pink flower against bright green leaves. It might be tiny black bees on white daisy blossoms. Or it might be colorful bees - or butterflies - and their blooms.

Explore Outdoors ~ Spring Natives

 

Last week the shadbush were blooming. These native are in the genus Amelanchier (am-uh-LAN-sheer) and go by a number of names: serviceberry, shadblow, juneberry, saskatoon - and more. If you look closely you see that they are related to apples, pears, and others in the rose family (they have five petals). 

Look closer and you can see that the local bees are busy collecting pollen. Bees aren't the only insects that depend on serviceberries. A whole bunch of caterpillars feed on the leaves - brimstone moth, grey dagger, red-spotted purple and white admiral, as well as other insects. Not to mention that deer and rabbits browse the leaves and tender twigs. And at least 35 species of birds will nosh on the berries when they ripen. Catbirds, robins, thrushes, orioles - those are a few of the local birds that will be plucking fruits from the trees around here.

What flowering trees do you see in your neighborhood this week?

Explore Outdoors ~ Little Bees do a Big Job

My garden is a haven for small bees of every make and model: metallic green bees, fuzzy gray bees, huge shiny black carpenter bees, and yellow-and-black bumble bees. On a warm afternoon it can be positively noisy with all the humming and buzzing.

Next time you pass by a patch of flowers, pay attention to the insects flying - and crawling - around on the flowers. Coneflowers, like this, attract a diversity of bees as well as butterflies, beetles, and flower flies. They're like a busy take-out place.

Wednesday Explorers Club ~ bizzie, buzzy bees

Last month I headed out to my garden to count pollinators for the Great Sunflower Project. I love finding these shiny gem-like natives on my flowers (here it's checking out just-blooming calendula)

What kinds of bees do you see on the flowers growing in your neighborhood?

The Buzz on Bee Books

Spring is here. Trees are flowering and dandelions are blooming, providing pollen for the native bees and honey bees. So this week I'm focusing on bees. And drop by on Sunday for Earth Day!

theme: bees, nature, environment

Turn this Book into a Beehive!
by Lynn Brunelle; illus. by Anna-Maria Jung
192 pages; ages 8-12
Workman Publishing, 2018

Bees... whether you love 'em or hate 'em, we need bees for our survival.

That may sound over-dramatic, but the truth is that bees are a keystone species. That means, writes author Lynn Brunelle, "plants and animals in an ecosystem depend on them for survival." That dependence includes us - because one third of the food we eat depends on bees for pollination. Think: blueberries, apples, almonds, cucumbers.

But there's a problem. Bee populations are in decline. Not just honey bees, but the hard-working native pollinators that provide millions of dollars worth of free labor to fruit farmers. If you've followed this blog for long, you know I am passionate about pollinators - especially bees. Bumble bees, carpenter bees, mason bees, leafcutter bees, digger bees...they are all too important to lose.

What I like love about this book: It introduces us to bees, pollination, and then invites us to make friends with two kinds of bees: mason bees and honey bees. It includes 20 activities and experiments that provide children and families a safe way to learn about our busy, buzzy neighbors. And BEST of ALL - you can turn the book into a beehive for native bees. Durable cover and instructions included.

The King of Bees
by Lester L. Laminack; illus. by Jim LaMarche
32 pages; ages 4-8
Peachtree Publishers, 2018

Henry and Aunt Lilla lived deep in the Lowcountry, where South Carolina reaches out and mingles with the saltwater for form tidal creeks and marshes.

Henry and his aunt live in a small house with a vegetable garden, a hen house, and beehives. He can't wait until he is old enough to help care for the bees. Henry wants his own coveralls and bee hat. He also loves the bees, their humming, and the stories Aunt Lilla tells about how the sister bees work together.

"Don't they have any brother bees?" Henry asks. Then one day the bees begin to swarm and Henry decides he'll help guide the bees to the new hive box Aunt Lilla is getting ready. Things don't go as planned and he has a closer encounter with bees than he expected.

What I like about this book: The warm, inviting illustrations that are so luscious I just want to walk into the scenes. The lyrical language and the gentle pace of the story - it is told on bee time, not fast human time. And the loving relationship between Henry and his aunt.


Buzzing Beyond the Books:

Go on a bee walk. Look at plants in yards and gardens, weeds growing along roadways... how many different kinds of bees do you see? Here's a "gallery of bees" over at the Great Sunflower Project. Just click on the photos to learn more about each kind of bee. Also check out this article at National Wildlife Federation - there's a great photo of different kinds of native bees.

Let part of your yard go wild - many of the plants we consider "weeds" provide pollen for native bees: asters, dandelions, yarrow, violets, mints, mullein. Or plant some native flowers for the bees - here's a link to get you started. You can find pollinator-friendly plant lists for your region at the Xerces Society site.

Learn more about Mason bees here.

And check out a video of honeybee waggle dance here. Then practice the steps so you can use the waggle dance to tell someone how to find the best flowers in your neighborhood.

Construct your own honeycomb of paper hexagons. All you need are some paper towel rolls. Here's how.

Today we're joining the STEM Friday roundup - and we're also joining others over at Perfect Picture Book Friday, an event in which bloggers share great picture books at Susanna Leonard Hill's site. She keeps an ever-growing list of Perfect Picture Books. Review copies from publishers

Wordless Wednesday

Bee-Watching

Next week is National Pollinator Week. It's a perfect time to go bee-watching. Bee-watching is a lot like bird-watching except you don't need binoculars, and you can get closer to bees than you can to birds. But not too close!

• How do the bees in your neighborhood sound? Listen carefully and soon you'll be able to tell whether it's a honey bee or a bumble bee or some other kind of bee flying around you. Even different kinds of bumble bees hum at different pitches.
• Draw pictures of the different kinds of bees you have in your yard or neighborhood - even vacant lots with lots of weeds will have bees to watch. Color them so you can remember if this one was the shiny green bee or the dark black bee. Jot down some notes too: is it bigger than your thumb? Smaller than your pinkie nail?
• Follow a bee around. Bumble bees are the best because they don't care if you give them some room. Plus they're slow. What color of flowers does your bee visit? How long does she stay on one flower? If you have a watch with a second hand, you can time her. How many flowers does she visit before she flies away home? And are they close together or in a line?
• What happens if another bee - or a large moth or hummingbird - visits the same flower? Does your bee stay or leave?

Count bees for science! Become a bee-watcher for the Great Sunflower Project.  Let part of your lawn grow a bit wild so the weeds can produce flowers to feed the bees. Or, if you have room, plant some flowers for the bees. All you need are a few containers on a patio or rooftop or balcony...

Wild bees like:

• Aster
• Bee balm
• Bellflower
• Bleeding heart
• Borage
• Chives
• Coreopsis
• Cosmos
• Daffodil
• Dandelion
• Geraniums
• Goldenrod
• Hyssop
• Joe-pye weed
• Lemon balm
• Milkweed
• Mints
• Mullein
• Oregano
• Poppy
• Purple coneflower
• Roses
• Sage
• Sunflower
• Thyme
• Violet
• Yarrow
• Zinnia

Wordless Wednesday

National Pollinator Week June 16 - 22

This week, take a moment to think about things you can do to help pollinators. Pollinator conservation isn’t just something for fields and nature preserves – the bees and flies and butterflies and other pollinators are all around us. So protecting them is something we can all do. And we must, because pollinators are fundamental to the health of our environment, our farms, our gardens – not to mention chocolate.

 What can you do? Start by checking out the action steps on Xerces Society's Bring Back the Pollinators page.

Get involved with a Citizen Science pollinator project. Here are a few to get you started:

• Bee Hunt
• Bumble Bee Watch
• The Great Sunflower Project
• Native Buzz
• Monarch Watch

If you don't have any pollinators flitting around your house, plant a patch of flowers for them, or let a section of your yard go wild for the summer. Then go see how many are visiting your neighborhood.

Take a close look.... even closer, and get to know these guys. Take some photos - or draw a picture.

You can check out past "pollinator posts" here.

Wordless Wednesday

Follow a Pollinator

Every third bite you eat is made possible by a pollinator - a bee or moth or butterfly that moved pollen from one flower to another. Who are the pollinators in your neighborhood? Most likely bumblebees and other native bees - some so small that you may not even pay attention to them, and others that look kinda like honeybees.

Bees collect pollen to take back home, tucking it into "pollen baskets" on their legs. But they're a bit messy, and some pollen sticks to their feet and their face and the tiny hairs all over their body. So when they visit the next flower, some of that pollen gets brushed onto a stigma (the female flower part that receives pollen). The bee collects more pollen, visits the next flower and drops some more there, carrying pollen from one flower to the next until she heads home.

How many flowers does a bee visit when she's out on her pollen-collecting journey? You can find out by following a bee (but don't get so close that you bother her). If you want to make a map of bee journeys across your yard carry some flags and poke one in the ground near each flower a bee visits. [You can make flags by tying orange or pink surveyor's tape onto thin wires]

Can you pollinate as well as a bee? Grab a dry watercolor paint brush and try it. One of the easiest flowers to pollinate is cosmos. If you have two different colors of flowers, try moving the pollen from one cosmos (maybe an orange flower) to another (say, pink).  Tie a piece of yarn or ribbon to the flower stalk so later on you can collect the seeds. Then next year, plant the seeds and see what you end up with. [Watermelons, pumpkins, squash and cucumbers are also easy to hand pollinate - make sure you mark the stem of your fruit.]

Check out other STEM Friday resources here. And check out the Great Sunflower Project to see how you can become a citizen scientist studying pollinators.

Digging Digger Bees

digger bee up close

A couple months ago I noticed a cluster of soil mounds in my driveway. They looked like anthills, but I didn’t see any ants. What I did see: lots of bees flying about.

These are “digger bees” – ground-nesting bees that excavate a series of vertical and horizontal tunnels in the earth. It turns out that 60 percent of the bees in my state of NY are ground-nesting, solitary bees. They might live alone, but they often build their nests in bee villages, or aggregations. Sometimes those villages can be dense, with more than 100 nests in a square yard. Mine aren’t nearly so crowded; there are only 4 to 7 nest sites in a square foot. Perhaps that has something to do with my clay-filled soil and stony hard-packed drive.

They don’t always dig in driveways; some build their nests in lawns or on the banks of streams. Check out your neighborhood. If you are lucky enough to have digger bees living nearby, spend some time watching them. They don't seem to mind being watched. Here's a few questions you might want to ask:

• Where do they build their nests? What is the soil like: is it dry or wet? It is sandy or hard clay? Are there lots of rocks in the soil or is it in the forest beneath leaves and duff?
• Do different kinds of digger bees choose different locations for their nests? Does the same bee build nests in different kinds of soils or environments?
•  What is the nest density: how many nests in a square foot, or square yard? To find out, measure a square and count the number of soil mounds you see. You might want to make a map of your nests: are they spaced equally apart or are they clumped? If you have a smaller ruler you could measure the distance between nest entrances.
• Watch your bees over time. When do they get up in the morning? Are there times when they are more active? What happens if the weather gets really cold or really hot? What happens if there’s a big rainstorm?
• When the bees return from collecting pollen, what do they do? Do they circle over the area first?
•  How can a digger bee tell which is her nest when all the dirt mounds look alike? Do your bees use landmarks – and how could you test whether they do?

Check out the other STEM Friday posts today... and squeeze in a little time to check out the bees in your neighborhood.