Pollinators

Last week my Master Naturalist chapter had a meeting. Dave Crawford was the speaker. He was a naturalist at two state parks on the upper Saint Croix river for almost 40 years. Now he is retired. He takes lots of pictures with a lens that is for seriously small subjects. He gave us some advice for land stewardship to help pollinators.  Don't rake your leaves. I didn't rake my leaves this year and now I don't feel guilty about it. Don't remove the stalks from your garden. Sweet. I don't have to feel guilty about that either.  He listed quite a few fall chores I never got around to and gave me permission to forget about them. He talked about flies and butterflies and moths and bees and wasps and hornets. Bumble bees are strong bees. They can pry apart flower petals that do easily separate. Solitary bees tend  not to sting.  Bees that sting are social bees and they want to protect their young. My mind wandered as he talked.I thought about the life of the queen bee.  There she is, sitting in the hive with her multiple husbands taking care of her. The soldier bees defend her with their very lives. If reincarnation is real, maybe a queen bee would be a good choice. He showed us slides of plants that encourage pollinators. He showed bergamot which is also known as bee balm. I had a huge bergamot plant in my prairie this year. I grew it myself from seed I pilfered from his state park. He talked about the wild bergamot being healthier for the bee's immune system than the bergamot you buy at a local nursery. The nursery chooses bergamot with showy petals and bright colors. Then I remembered the three stings I got from ground nesting bees this fall. These three bee stings were the most painful bee stings I ever received.  These bee stings hurt and were red and swollen for a full month. Maybe the fact I planted bergamot led me to experience more pain. I don't know. I could have identified what kind of ground nesting bees I had in my yard but I didn't. I was hiding from them. He showed a film he took of the ground nesting bees digging their home.  He put his camera just inches from the bee. I asked if he got stung filming and he said no.  The bee dug sand out and threw it backwards just like my old dog, Ruby, did when she dug holes. Dirt went flying up in the air.  Pollinators are cool. I love moths and butterflies.  I like flies as long as I don't think about the maggot stage.  Bees, well, I know they are important.  I just don't like getting stung.