Pollinator-Friendly Hillside

Here at the History Center we're creating a new pollinator garden. We planted native species, and are limiting the use of herbicides and pesticides in order to provide food and habitat for a variety of pollinators.

We have pollinators to thank for many of the world's crops and flowers. Bees, butterflies, moths, flies, beetles, wasps, hummingbirds, bats, and even small mammals are all pollinators. They visit flowers for food (energy-rich nectar or protein-rich pollen) and transfer pollen grains between flowers of the same species, so plants can produce fertile fruits and seeds.

Pollinator gardens are environmentally friendly. Once established, native plants don't require fertilizer, herbicides, pesticides, or watering.

How can you help pollinators? It's easy!

Monarch butterfly on purple coneflower, from the side.

Monarch butterfly on purple coneflower. Credit: USDA Natural Resources Conservation Service.

Bumblebee on purple coneflower.

Bumblebee. Credit: Therese Scheller.

A monarch butterfly with wings open on a yellow flower, from above.

Monarch Butterfly. Credit: U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service

A monarch caterpillar eating a common milkweed leaf.

Monarch Caterpillar. Credit: USDA Agricultural Research Service

Bright orange milkweed flowers.

Butterfly Weed. Credit: Therese Scheller

Purple-pink milkweed flowers.

Common Milkweed. Credit: USDA Agricultural Research Service

Several spikes of small, white flowers.

Culver's Root. Credit: Wikimedia Commons

Purple daisy-like flowers.

New England Aster. Credit: U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service

Flowers with a large center and narrow, pink petals.

Pale Purple Coneflower. Credit: Therese Scheller

Flowers with a large reddish cone in the center and pink petals drooping.

Purple Coneflower. Credit: USDA Natural Resources Conservation Service

A tall flower with a pink tutu halfway up.

Purple Prairie Clover. Credit: Therese Scheller

Two spikes with small purple flowers blooming on the bottom halves.

Prairie Blazing Star. Credit: Therese Scheller

Pinkish-purple tube flowers with a bee.

Wild Bergamot. Credit: Therese Scheller