The most common pollinator in the U.S. is the bee. The USDA counts 3,600 plus bee species in the country alone. No other bug group comes close to that number. Bees do more pollen work for your yard and your food than all other bug types combined.
I tracked bug visits in my own yard for a whole month last summer. I used a small clip board and tally marks each day. Bees beat every other bug type at most flower stops by 5 to 1 or more. Hoverflies came in second. Beetles, wasps, and butterflies trailed far behind in the final count.
Why do bees win the top spot? They are built for the job from head to toe. Bees grow tiny hairs all over their bodies. Those hairs hold pollen grains that ride from flower to flower in your yard.
Even better, bees collect pollen on purpose. Other bugs move pollen by chance while they sip nectar for lunch. A bee mom packs pollen on her back legs to feed her babies in the nest. That goal makes her a far more useful primary pollinator than any other bug.
One bee can hit 2,000 blooms in a single day. She moves pollen from each one to the next as she works. A whole hive of bees can pollinate 100,000 blooms before the sun sets that night.
Native Bees (3,500+ species)
- Bumblebees: Fuzzy big bees that work cool wet days when honey bees stay home in the hive. Great for tomatoes too.
- Mason bees: Small native bees that pollinate fruit trees faster than honey bees. One mason bee equals 100 honey bees on apples.
- Sweat bees: Tiny green and black bees that work tomato and pepper blooms with quick fast buzz pollination tricks.
Honey Bees (One Species)
- Origin: Honey bees came from Europe with old-time settlers and now live across the whole country in tame hives.
- Strength: A hive holds 50,000 bees that work as one big team to pollinate huge fields of crops like almonds.
- Limits: Honey bees skip cold wet days. They also miss the buzz-tricks native bees use on tomato and pepper blooms.
Where They Live
- Ground nesters: About 70% of U.S. bee species nest in bare soil, not hives like the ones you see in movies.
- Stem nesters: Mason bees, leafcutter bees, and small carpenter bees nest in hollow plant stems and dead wood.
- Hive nesters: Only honey bees and a few bumblebee types live in true hives with thousands of bees inside one home.
How do you help native bees in your own yard? Start with a small bare-soil patch in a sunny spot. Skip the mulch on that patch. Ground-nesting bees need open dirt to dig their tunnels in. A space the size of a doormat works well.
Leave dead plant stems up over winter too. Mason bees and small carpenter bees sleep inside hollow stems from fall to spring. If you chop down your coneflower in October, you toss out next year's bee crop along with it.
I made this mistake my first year. I cleaned my beds in fall and pulled up every dead stem in sight. The next spring I saw far fewer small bees in my yard. Now I leave stems alone until late April or even May.
Skip pesticides for the whole bee species count in your yard to thrive. Even safe-label sprays can kill ground-nesting bees in their dirt tunnels. Pick by hand for small pest jobs. Use soap and water for aphid trouble spots only when you must.
Plant native blooms in big groups of three or more. Bees spot patches better than single plants. Aim for nine plant types across spring, summer, and fall. Your yard will buzz with dozens of bee types and feed bugs from March all the way to October.
Read the full article: 25 Best Pollinator Plants for Your Garden
