National Pollinator Week

Title: National Pollinator Week
Location: Texas
Link out: Click here
Description: Gov. Rick Perry has signed a proclamation making June 18-24 National Pollinator Week in Texas. This includes the Lone Star State in an international celebration recognizing bees, birds, bats, beetles and butterflies for their service to farmers and gardeners alike.

“The annual value of bee-pollinated crops to the U.S. economy is estimated at over $15 billion,” says Michael Warriner, invertebrate biologist with the Texas Parks and Wildlife Department. “In North America, most plant pollination is carried out by bees.”

Roughly one third of all the food we eat is because of pollination that happened in a farmer’s field, Warriner says. During a single day, a female bee may visit several hundred flowers, depositing pollen all along the way.

Bees are tremendously successful pollinators for two main reasons. Many people think that bees go from flower to flower to collect nectar for their hive and just so happen to be dusted with pollen but bees collect the pollen from the flower deliberately. Pollen is used as a food source not only for the bees themselves, but also for their young. The other reason is because bees tend to visit certain species of plant per trip, preventing cross pollination or pollen being wasted on a different species.
Start Date: 2012-06-18
End Date: 2012-06-24