Native plants are popular with gardeners, in part due to their purported benefits to pollinators. Studies have examined the relative attractiveness of regionally relevant native plants to wild bees in other areas of the United States, but no studies were available for plants native to the Pacific Northwest. We conducted...
Biological control (“Biocontrol”) is the use of living organisms to suppress pest populations. Insect predators and parasitoids are important biocontrol agents (also known as natural enemies) in garden systems. Studies have examined the relative attractiveness of garden plants to insect natural enemies in other areas of the United States, but...
Urban gardens are uniquely positioned to support bee conservation. Gardens, when managed for pollinators, can provide food sources (pollen and nectar), nesting sites, and mating sites. Some bees (like sweat bees in the family Halictidae), are known to thrive in urban areas, we wanted to understand what types of bees...
Bees, like humans, have food preferences. While there may be a diversity of plants to forage from in a landscape, bees may preferentially visit specific flowering plants. Nectar and pollen are the primary resources bees collect from flowers. Bees might collect nectar from many different plants, but they can be...
“Leafcutter bee” is the nickname for bees in the family Megachilidae. Like the name suggests, some bees in this family cut portions of leaves as nesting material. Leafcutters, however, are not limited to leaves alone! Some use mud, resin, sticks, pebbles, or petals in their nest construction. Megachile montivaga (the...
Bees, like humans, have three types of photoreceptors in their compound eyes that allow them to see color. Bees see ultraviolet (UV) light, blue light, and green light, whereas most humans see red, blue, and green. We developed a methodology1 to simulate bee vision that can be used to photograph...
Healthy soils are the basis for sustainable gardening. Although agricultural soils have been extensively studied, we know surprisingly little about residential and community garden soils. We studied the physical, biological, and chemical characteristics of soils from 67 vegetable garden in the Willamette Valley, and compared these to published recommendations for...
To understand how a garden’s characteristics influence the soil microbial community, we sampled bacterial microbes from 40 Oregon gardens. Half of the gardens were located in Central Oregon, and the other half were located in the Willamette Valley. Within each region, half of the gardeners reported that they only used...