Information event promotes benefits of pollinators

Breann Blankenship, 7, looks over a monarch butterfly on her arm while she waits for it to fly away during a monarch butterfly release at the Pollinator Expo June 20 at the Wright Brothers Memorial near Area B. Like bees, monarch butterflies are an important pollinator species that primarily due to habitat loss and fragmentation, have been facing a drastic decline in population. (U.S. Air Force photo/Stacey Geiger)

Information event promotes benefits of pollinators

Published July 2, 2018
By W. Eugene Barnett
88th Air Base Wing Public Affairs

WRIGHT-PATTERSON AIR FORCE BASE, Ohio – Wright-Patterson Air Force Base held its second annual Pollinator Expo June 20, at the Wright Brothers Memorial near Area B.

Informational tables from organizations throughout southwest Ohio explained how to create or improve habitat for butterflies and bees who are critical to our food supplies.

Guest speakers were there every hour talking about the importance of habitat for butterflies and bees.

“My first memories of nature were swimming in the lake and fishing with my mother in Camden, Arkansas as a small child,” said Hope Taft, former First Lady of Ohio from 1999-2007. “We need pollinators to make flowers and food plants. Life is hooked up together. Plants for bees and butterflies must be protected.”

Along with bees and butterflies, ants are pollinators too, according to Taft.

“Ohio has 500 different native bees and experts believe we had more in the past even though 45 to 55 percent of our Ohio lands cannot be pollinated because of chemical use,” she said.

“Nature’s pollinators provide us with over $500 billion of crops worldwide annually, yet turf grass is the largest irrigated crop in America,” said Taft.

Golden rod, Milkweed and Clover are native plants that Monarch butterflies need to survive.

“We can make a difference,” said Taft.

For additional information on bees and butterflies go to the Wright-Patterson Natural Resources Facebook page, https://www.facebook.co m/WrightPattersonNaturalResources/ or contact Danielle Trevino at (937) 257-8555.