Low pollinator numbers may require year-round flower gardens

Bees and other pollinators are more likely to visit gardens that bloom year-round and have a wide variety of flowers and plants.

The results, which came amid concerns about declining bee populations and a potential threat to food supplies, were published after a series of tests on different types of gardens.

A team of American researchers writes in the journal PLOS One that keeping a garden in continuous bloom is more important than the plants in the surrounding fields or land. These plants have long been considered by some botanists to be the key to ensuring that pollinators are active in and visit a garden.

“A diverse and lush floral planting that provides blooming flowers throughout the season may be more important to bees and other pollinators than anything surrounding the flower garden,” said the researchers, led by Devon Eldridge of the University of Tennessee.

The team reached its conclusions after experimenting with four types of gardens at five locations. Three of them consisted of plants from one family and one “consisted of a mixture of plants from all three families.”

The four gardens were recreated at five sites with different “surrounding land uses,” which the researchers listed as “urban garden, forage grassland, mixed farming, forest, and organic farm.”

After capturing and counting thousands of pollinating bees, the team found that the “mixed agricultural planting site” attracted the most bees, with the area near the urban garden or the surrounding fields or roads providing the best “context.”

In recent years, there have been several warnings about declining bee populations, meaning the world could soon face a serious threat to plant life and, consequently, crop yields and food supplies.

In July, the journal Nature published a warning from scientists that the production of fruits, vegetables, nuts and pulses could be “limited by inadequate pollinator visits.” The team, led by researchers at Rutgers University in New Brunswick, examined over 1,500 fields on 6 continents.