College Students Visit Bethpage State Park for a Pollinator Bioblitz Field Day!

 

Did you know that pollinator conservation and awareness is an integral part of our environmental initiatives at Bethpage State Park? Over the years we have learned that providing forage for hungry butterflies, moths, bees and hummingbirds encourages pollination and facilitates the next generation of plants. This process also helps beautify our park. No greater example exists than within our Picnic Pollinator Garden! Today this garden grows lush and tall. It contains over 100 native plants, blooming as early as April and well into October.   

 

While the intention of creating this garden was to promote biodiversity,  it has led to far more opportunities. The first is offering the local community an outdoor classroom; a chance to explore the plant- insect interactions that make for a thriving, cohesive habitat.

The second opportunity is providing an outlet for data collection. In this case, monitoring and documenting pollinating species. Data collected is not just important to us as a park, but valuable to the wider scientific community; many biologists and researchers rely on citizen science efforts because they are looking to understand pollinator trends but unable to survey nationwide.  

 

To unite these two opportunities, I organized a Bioblitz through iNaturalist and invited a grad/undergraduate Entomology class to our Picnic Pollinator Garden. First the students received a tour of the garden (note - earlier in the year, I met with the students to give a presentation on our pollinator/garden efforts, but this was the first time that any of them had visited!). 

 

 

We discussed later blooming native plants and why it is important to offer flowers of varying shapes, sizes and colors to attract a variety of pollinators. To familiarize themselves with pollinators they might see I provided reference sheets and then they got out there!

 Students monitored insect diversity, collected specimens and took photographs. This was made easy with a combination of tools, nets that they brought and insect catching devices (with a magnifier) that I provided.

Later, students submitted their findings to our iNaturalist Bioblitz project. For anyone who has never heard of the term "Bioblitz" it simply refers to a data collecting event that acts as a short-term study. Anyone can participate and the goal is to identify as many species as possible. In this case, the Bioblitz we were hosting was for the month of September and focused on pollinators.             Click here to see the Stats!

 Safe to say that the entomology students and I had a fun-filled pollinator FIELD DAY!

 

Thank you to all the students who participated and spent their Entomology lab class with us at Bethpage State Park. Come back soon!