Attracting new pollinators

Hello dear Hive lovers, on this occasion I am going to talk to you about a little of our efforts at Vida Verde to attract new pollinators.

A few days ago a friend came with whom we are planning to go on a bird watching route here at the house. These are the advantages of living in a wild place. Since the last time another friend came with this, there are two visits to verify if the site is suitable for bird watching. Until the time of this publication we have detected a similar number on both visits, 44 birds on average. Here in Venezuela you have to have a minimum of 100 birds to be a verified site to be classified as a bird watching site.

Flowers for pollinators

Although most flowers attract pollinators, this is where it becomes a very important and meticulous task to choose which plants to use to attract different insects and birds, which is what interests us at this moment.

common water hyacinth

The common water hyacinth or water lily is a strictly aquatic species that attracts pollinators such as bumblebees, bees and some hummingbirds, so we have it in mind to be able to enjoy these friends when they come to visit and pollinate the flower.

Sphagneticola trilobata

It is a plant native to neotropical areas, it is capable of attracting the attention of several species of bees, and we have even seen some pollinating birds that have landed.

Majaguillo

This tree is very important to us because there are already three of them, one large and two in the process of growing. The importance of this tree is that in the dry season last year we saw approximately 30 hummingbirds perched on top of this tree. It is likely that it was the mating season. We will know that in the next dry season.

Purple lovebird

This emblematic flower of the shrub called in scientific name Lantana trifolia is a perennial shrub that produces a purple flower but there are other species that produce white, yellow, orange flowers. Used in popular culture to take infusion baths to get rid of bad luck. This is a shrub capable of attracting very small hummingbirds.

Dandelion

This species is very common in various parts of the world. It attracts a huge number of bumblebees and bees. So it is also on the list of species that we are going to plant around our house.

And at this point you may be wondering. Isn't this post about birds?
Yes, it is certainly about birds but we have to keep in mind that native species of trees and shrubs have to attract different pollinators and that is where not only birds but also others such as bees and bumblebees come in. The idea is to emulate what nature does and this is the best way.

Finally, I will leave two images of the routes we have taken with the Ebird app where we identified 44 species of birds.