[Pollinator] Farmers add plants to attract, nourish bees

Fri Oct 21 10:15:47 PDT 2011

cid:image001.png at 01CC8FDA.181BCF60

Farmers add plants to attract, nourish bees

By GOSIA WOZNIACKA, Associated Press

http://www.washingtonpost.com/business/farmers-in-calif-other-states-use-bee
-friendly-plants-to-attract-bolster-native-pollinators/2011/10/21/gIQAXPEW2L
_story.html

Friday, October 21, 2011

<http://www.sfgate.com/cgi-bin/object/article?f=/n/a/2011/10/21/national/a00
0240D80.DTL&o=0&type=printable> In this photo taken Wednesday, Oct. 19,
2011, farmer Niki...
<http://www.sfgate.com/cgi-bin/object/article?f=/n/a/2011/10/21/national/a00
0240D80.DTL&o=1&type=printable> In this photo taken Wednesday, Oct. 19,
2011, farmer Niki...

(10-21) 01:34 PDT Del Rey, Calif. (AP) --

Dozens of farmers in California and other states have started replacing some
of their crops with flowers and shrubs that are enticing to bees, hoping to
lower their pollination costs and restore a bee population devastated in the
past few years.

On an October morning, peach farmer Mas Masumoto planted more than 3 acres
of wild rose, aster, sage, manzanita and other shrubs and trees in a former
grape field near Fresno, Calif.

To the north near Modesto, Calif., David Moreland was preparing to plant
wildflower seeds and flowering shrubs in a ravine along his 400-acre almond
orchard.

Their goal is to attract and sustain native bees and strengthen dwindling
honeybee populations, joining in an effort organized by the Xerces Society,
a Portland, Ore.-based nonprofit group.

"For bees to thrive, they need a diverse diet, so we're trying to bring more
pollen diversity to farms, more plants to be part of the bees' buffet," said
Mace Vaughan, the group's pollinator program director. "This isn't a panacea
to pollination woes. This is part of the solution overall."

The effort comes as honeybees - maintained by beekeepers - and native, or
wild, bees are perishing in great numbers. Bees are essential pollinators of
about one-third of the United States' food supply, and they're especially
important in California, the nation's top producer of fruits and vegetables.

The die-off is blamed on colony collapse disorder, in which all the adult
honey bees in a colony suddenly die. The disorder has destroyed honeybee
colonies at a rate of about 30 percent per year since it was recognized in
2006, according to the U.S. Department of Agriculture. Before that, about 15
percent of colonies died per year from a variety of pests and diseases.

Researchers aren't sure what causes the disorder, but they suspect a
combination of stressors, including pesticides, mites and parasites, and
lack of proper nutrition.

The problem is especially dire in California, where large farms often grow
single crops that rely on pollination but don't offer bees a varied diet.

Almond orchards, which have grown dramatically in recent years, have some of
the worst problems. Two-thirds of the nation's honeybees are now trucked to
the state during winter for almond bloom, but the arriving bees don't have
enough forage.

Beekeepers feed bees with supplements, including corn syrup, weakening bees
and increasing costs. Prices for renting bee colonies have more than tripled
over the last decade, from $43 per colony in 2000 to $150 per colony in
2010. Almond orchards require about 2 colonies per acre.

Getting farmers to plant bee habitat is key, Vaughan said, because bees with
nutritionally sound diets are better able to fend off diseases and other
problems.

Bee habitat can also reduce a farmer's costs and alleviate the stress on
honeybees. Through research on California's watermelons, University
<http://www.sfgate.com/education-guide/>  of California, Berkeley, professor
Claire Kremen found that if a farmer sets aside between 20 percent and 30
percent of a field for bee habitat, the farm can get all or most of its
pollination from native bees.

That's unrealistic for most farms, but Kremen said adding hedgerows and
other plantings can help sustain a beneficial combination of native and
commercial bees. Research has found that native bees make commercial
honeybees more efficient pollinators by getting in their way and making them
take a more circuitous route from plant to plant.

"What it means is you don't have to have a huge number of native bees, but
if you have some then the combination of honeybees and native bees has a
huge effect," Kremen said.

Other researchers have found that setting aside bee habitat leads to better
crop production on the remaining land, compensating the farmer.

The California State Beekeepers Association is also helping farmers to
improve habitat. Run by Project Apis m. - which funds and directs research
to improve the health of honeybees - the program has enlisted growers to
dedicate acreage to bees and is identifying which seed mixtures make for
best bee forage on farms and in orchards.

"We want to make sure bees don't starve to death before and after almond
pollination," said Christi Heintz, executive director of Project Apis m.

The goal, Heintz said, is to make it economically viable for farmers to
plant bee habitat. One option, Heintz said, is to plant a bee-friendly crop
that can be used as biofuel, such as canola and camelina. Another is
partnering with the cosmetics industry, growing oil seed plants such as
cuphea and echium that are used in creams.

Another California-based nonprofit, Partners for Sustainable Pollination,
awards a bee-friendly farming label to farmers who set aside at least 6
percent of their land for bee forage, minimize pesticide use and have
nesting areas and a water source. So far, 120 farms in 29 states have
received the label.

But for many farmers, such as almond growers, increasing bee habitat remains
difficult.

Farmers keep orchard floors clean because they harvest almonds off the
ground and because bare ground warms faster and is less prone to frost.
Pesticide sprayed on trees also is harmful to bees, and mature orchards can
be too shady for flowers and shrubs. And plants can be expensive, requiring
irrigation for the first few years.

To get around the problem, Moreland has opted to grow flowering shrubs in a
nearby ravine and has planted wildflower seeds in a young orchard that won't
go into production for several years and isn't treated with pesticides.
Giving bees access to more food makes a big difference, he said.

"The bees can continue to forage and get stronger, so it's one less stress
on them, one less having to feed them artificial food, one more chance for
the bees to survive," Moreland said.

Although bees aren't needed to pollinate Masumoto's peach orchard, studies
have shown bees move pollen quickly and help produce better fruit.

But the biggest benefit, he said, is not about money.

"A real farm is not just a factory in the field, but a way to work with
nature," Masumoto said. "The more nature plays a role, the more
opportunities will arise to make things better."

http://sfgate.com/cgi-bin/article.cgi?f=/n/a/2011/10/21/national/a000240D80.
DTL

 <http://www.sfgate.com/chronicle/info/copyright/> C 2011 Hearst
Communications Inc. | Privacy Policy <http://www.sfgate.com/pages/privacy/>
| Feedback <http://www.sfgate.com/feedback/>  | RSS Feeds
<http://www.sfgate.com/rss/>  | FAQ
<http://www.sfgate.com/chronicle/faq.shtml>  | Site Index
<http://www.sfgate.com/index/>  | Contact <http://www.sfgate.com/staff/>  

_______

Scott Hoffman Black

Executive Director

     The Xerces Society for Invertebrate Conservation

Chair

     IUCN Butterfly Specialist Group

The Xerces Society for Invertebrate Conservation

1971 - 2011: Forty Years of Conservation!

We have moved!

628 NE Broadway, Suite 200, Portland, OR 97232, USA

 <https://webmail.integra.net/src/compose.php?send_to=sblack%40xerces.org>
sblack at xerces.org

Tel: (503) 232-6639 ext. 101

Toll free: 1-855-232-6639 ext. 101

Cell: (503) 449-3792

The Xerces Society for Invertebrate Conservation is an international
nonprofit organization that protects wildlife through the conservation of
invertebrates and their habitat.

To join the Society, make a contribution, or read about our work, please
visit  <http://www.xerces.org> www.xerces.org.

NEW BOOK NOW AVAILABLE:

<http://www.xerces.org/announcing-the-publication-of-attracting-native-polli
nators/> Attracting Native Pollinators. Protecting North America's Bees and
Butterflies

-------------- next part --------------
An HTML attachment was scrubbed...
URL: <http://lists.sonic.net/pipermail/pollinator/attachments/20111021/d7ed1efa/attachment.html>
-------------- next part --------------
A non-text attachment was scrubbed...
Name: not available
Type: image/gif
Size: 4030 bytes
Desc: not available
URL: <http://lists.sonic.net/pipermail/pollinator/attachments/20111021/d7ed1efa/attachment.gif>
-------------- next part --------------
A non-text attachment was scrubbed...
Name: not available
Type: image/gif
Size: 3515 bytes
Desc: not available
URL: <http://lists.sonic.net/pipermail/pollinator/attachments/20111021/d7ed1efa/attachment-0001.gif>