Pollinator Pathway Project
Well the weather outside is frightful – but I’m daydreaming of spring and green shoots emerging from the earth, and that wonderful smell of healthy soil. I am so happy to announce that the Pollinator Pathway Project is up and running!
The videos, downloads and guided drawings are on this webpage and the project is free to participate if you live here in Saskatoon. Where I grew up the wildflowers bloomed in beautiful orchestration and I took it for granted, the fireweed, gave way to milkweed and purple vetch and I never once considered the pollinators.
It’s hard to miss all the news these days about bees in decline and pollinators disappearing. I challenge you to watch this short film on the declining Rusty Patched Bee and not feel regret. There are many children’s books on bees and I’ll say it again, children are natural observers – they see adults afraid of insects and they become afraid of insects. Here in Saskatchewan, there are not a lot of insects that can really hurt us – and we owe it to our children to teach them the value of insects, after all I wouldn’t want a job pollinating – would you? I can’t guarantee that building bees out of LEGO will change lives - but it could teach our children a little of the diversity that surrounds us, and to value that diversity and perhaps to protect what we value.
I am so thankful for the neighbourhood we live in, Silverspring is uniquely located with easy access to the River Valley, Forestry Farm, housing the Natural Grasslands, and bounded by the North East Swale. The pollinators that live in these natural ecosystems move between native plants and what we plant in our yards. A few years ago I asked Lyndon Penner, a local gardening expert to suggest plantings for my yard to attract more birds. Each year we slowly add more of the trees, shrubs and plants he suggested and slowly more birds are finding us. The Canadian Wildlife Federation also has a webpage about creating a wildlife friendly garden, more information is available here.
The goal of the Pollinator Pathway Project is to get 12 classrooms in 6 schools, that should be 300 families, that are planting long blooming and nectar rich annuals this summer. Homeschool families are welcome to participate and the Community Associations in Silverspring, Evergreen and Willowgrove have also been asked to participate. Although I would have loved to provide perennial and native plant seeds, I wanted to pick flowers that parents wouldn’t hesitate to plant and that children would see flower over a long period this summer. If you are interested in learning more about perennials, the Saskatoon Perennial Society is a great source of information and works to educate and connect gardeners, they can be reached here. The Native Plant Society of Saskatchewan would happily provide your children with seeds of native plants, they can be reached here. If you are looking for a unique gift Blazing Star Wildflower Seed company has seeds you can order.
The City of Saskatoon is dedicated to planting for pollinators and is testing some native plants at test sites on the bike paths behind St. Joseph’s Collegiate, and the trail that intersects Fedoruk between Evergreen and Silverspring. You may notice the beautiful flowers that they are growing there.
The last part of this project is to create a collaborative map – each student or family that provides their street address (not house numbers please) will be added to a collaborative map that I will host on my website. I want to show the participants how their individual actions add up to make a wonderful pollinator pathway through our swath of the city, and show how we are all connected – the pesticides don’t just impact your yard they impact the pollinators in my yard and those pollinators fly.
This old gem seems fitting for the wonderful teachers and students who are investing in their future and healthier landscapes,
“Never doubt that a small group of thoughtful, committed citizens can change the world; indeed, it's the only thing that ever has.”
-Margaret Mead