Why Are Pollinators Important?Not only are pollinators important for producing food, they are vital to a healthy, balanced habitat.
Most pollinator insects need specific host and nectar plants to survive. When these plants are absent, pollinators disappear from the habitat, and in turn, plants and animals (including us) in the food web suffer. |
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(image from Xerces Society)
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Bees and other pollinators touch our lives every day in ways we may not realize. They are responsible for as much as one third of the food and drinks that we consume, and contribute to the production of our clothes... Read More
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Somewhere between 75% and 95% of all flowering plants on the earth need help with pollination – they need pollinators. Pollinators provide pollination services to over 180,000 different plant species and more than 1200 crops... That means that 1 out of every three bites of food you eat is there because of pollinators. If we want to talk dollars and cents, pollinators add 217 billion dollars to the global economy, and honey bees alone are responsible for between 1.2 and 5.4 billion dollars in agricultural productivity in the United States. In addition to the food that we eat, pollinators support healthy ecosystems that clean the air, stabilize soils, protect from severe weather, and support other wildlife...
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Growing a Greener World Episode 1008: Bringing Nature Home
Growing a Greener World When it comes to understanding the vital relationships between native plants and the wildlife that depends on them, Doug Tallamy is the acclaimed expert. This episode explores ways to incorporate nature into your landscape and help you understand why that’s so important. |
(Image from Doug Tallamy)
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We have destroyed natural habitat in so many places that local extinction is rampant and global extinction accelerating. This is a growing problem for humanity because it is the plants and animals around us that produce the life support we all depend on. Every time a species is lost from an ecosystem, that ecosystem is less able to support us. - Doug Tallamy
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