The Green Guy: Kits will help you create a pollinator-friendly habitat

Every year, there seems to be more and more buzz about bees, butterflies, and pollinators. More information seems to come out about their benefits, pesticide alternatives for your plants, or the “top 5” things you can do encourage more visits to your flower or vegetable garden.

Great as it is to have an abundance of resources, it can turn into quite the task to sift through and turn it into action. It’s understandable that for many, the process of picking out plants that are well-suited for their yard, meet their tastes, and can provide the best offerings for pollinators can be tasking. All the more, there’s a lot to consider around long term maintenance like annual replanting or perennial thinning and deciding on hybrids and heirlooms.

Now there is a remedy to all this. The Carlton SWCD, in partnership with Oldenburg Arts and Cultural Community and Xerces Society for Invertebrate Conservation, is unveiling its first native plant kit sale. The kits contain all the best species for our region for a bounty of colors while offering the best benefit to our pollinators.

We have seven kits available with plants for differing focuses: monarchs, songbirds, pollinators, shade, rain gardens, deer resistance, and under pine trees. The kits all contain 36 plugs of 7 plant species to cover an area of 150 square feet, all for $60.

The plants are supplied from Minnesota Native Landscapes, which helped us ensure that the kits are designed to be easy to plant, the plants easy to maintain, and provide a mix of colors and plant heights for best aesthetics and function for wildlife.

Orders are being taken now until June 5. Curbside pickup is scheduled for 8 a.m. to 6:30 p.m. June 19. We will be following social distancing guidelines for everyone’s safety. Visit our website for ordering at http://www.carltonswcd.org or call 218-384-3891.

Back when the state unveiled the Lawns to Legumes program and provided funding toward habitat for the endangered rusty patch bumblebee, conversations between the Oldenburg and our office were sparked. We wondered what else could be done to further pollinator prosperity in the area. What came into sight was the goal to make Carlton County the first pollinator corridor in the state.

This corridor aims to provide a network of pollinator habitat through voluntary plantings by residents and private businesses, supported by the partnership of our office with Oldenburg and the Xerces Society.

The idea is to connect dispersed interests in pollinator conservation toward a collaborative effort boosting the overall impact. Not only does this look to expand planting sites but also seeks to record current established plots. If you host a pollinator garden, let us know. If you are interested in sponsoring or hosting a garden — whether as a resident, private business, developer — reach out.

All inquiries regarding the pollinator corridor effort can be directed either to [email protected] (218-384-3891) or Emily Fuerste Swanson at [email protected] (763-226-6828).