Passport to Texas

Southern plains bumble bee. Courtesy of Jessica Womack.

New Pollinator Protocols Play Now | Play in Popup | Download

This is Passport to Texas

European honeybees and native bees, both important pollinators, are in decline.

With interest in declining pollinators, there’s been a call from a number of landowners for plans to help these species.

Texas Parks and Wildlife’s Michael Warriner says the agency developed new pollinator protocols for landowner use that begin with food and nesting sites for bees and other pollinators.

Let’s say you only have a few species of [flowers] that bloom in the spring. Not many in the summer. Not many in the fall. You could do a reseeding, or seed the area with native plant seed. Now, that can oftentimes be expensive if you have a lot of acres. In the protocols, we also describe another method of putting in native pollinator plots. You can consider this analogous to a deer food plot where you put in, let’s say, a half an acre. You seed it with good quality native plant seed. A number of species. And that’s your native pollinator plot, which makes it a little more cost effective than reseeding a really big area.

Find complete protocols on the Texas Parks and Wildlife website. Some landowners who implement protocols may qualify for a wildlife exemption.

If they’re actively wanting to develop a wildlife management plan for their property, they don’t have to do all the protocols; they can pick and choose what they want to do. If they need help, they can contact their local Texas Parks and Wildlife biologist in their region for help with this.

The Wildlife Restoration program supports our series.

For Texas Parks and Wildlife…I’m Cecilia Nasti.

Friendly neighborhood pollinator.

Pollinators in Peril Play Now | Play in Popup | Download

This is Passport to Texas

Pollinators are a trending topic these days.

We’re mainly talking about insects and sometimes mammals—like bats—who visit flowers.

Michael Warriner is non-game and rare species program leader for Texas Parks and Wildlife. Pollinators visit flowers for nectar or pollen, which they use as food.

But in the process, they’re transferring pollen from plant-to-plant, which the plant needs to become pollinated, and set viable seed.

Yet, over the years we’ve noticed a decline in the number of non-native and native pollinator species.

There’s a whole level of concern that’s manifested out of the concern for honeybees. Folks then started thinking about what’s going on with native bees, butterflies… And research shows that with things like bumblebees, there are a number of species that have experienced declines—that have disappeared from big parts of their range. And so there’s this whole overarching concern about native and non-native pollinators since their so closely tied to-–especially—human food production.

Tomorrow: how landowners can help revive slumping pollinator populations with Texas Parks and Wildlife’s new protocol.

The Wildlife Restoration program supports our series.

For Texas Parks and Wildlife…I’m Cecilia Nasti.

Mike Quinn on Central Texas Gardener with Tom Spencer. Photo credit: KLRU-TV, Austin

Outdoor Story: From Birds to Bugs Play Now | Play in Popup | Download

This is Passport to Texas Outdoor Stories

Mike Quinn is an entomologist whose interest in bugs developed through his family’s interest in birds.

My parents were birdwatchers, and I had an interest in outdoors as a child. But it wasn’t until I was in my twenties… I was helping ornithologists at UT study painted buntings at McKinney Falls State Park, and walked around the bend, and we saw this large butterfly there sunning itself – absolutely gorgeous in the sun – and Anita Fauquier says, “I think that’s a giant swallowtail.” And it hit me like a ton of bricks. It was an epiphany for me that you could put a name on an insect. Why that was a revelation to me I still don’t quite don’t know, because I could identify birds by sight and sound, and plants and herps and etcetera. But putting a name on an insect was somehow a foreign concept. And I went home and I borrowed my mother’s butterfly field guide (which I haven’t quite returned yet), and just from that point on I started paying much closer attention to insects, and that led me to my degree now that I have in entomology.

Do you have an Outdoor Story? Go to passporttotexas.org, and share it with us…and we might share it with Texas.

For Texas Parks and Wildlife…I’m Cecilia Nasti.

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A YouTube video of Mike Quinn on the KLRU-TV Austin (PBS affiliate) show Central Texas Gardener with Tom Spencer

Common Eastern Bubmle Bee (Bombus impatiens) worker in flight
TEXAS: Lamar Co. Camp Maxey National Guard Facility in Paris
27.August.2009 J.C. Abbott

Making Pollinators a Priority Play Now | Play in Popup | Download

Honeybees, native bees, bats, butterflies and other insects are pollinators, and are vital to our economy, food security, and environmental health. The Texas Parks and Wildlife Department Landowner Incentive Program, or LIP, can help interested landowners manage their property for pollinators.

09-The LIP program at the moment is prioritizing projects that are directed at pollinators. Pollinators are definitely hot.

Arlene Kalmbach coordinates the program.

33-Pollinators got on the Landowner Incentive priority list based on the funding source. The landowner Incentive Program is funded by the Fish and Wildlife Service–partners for fish and wildlife program. And pollinator projects are a high priority for them, so they are a high priority for us. They would have been a
high priority for us regardless of our funding source. But, it helps that everybody’s on the same page. So, with this next round of projects, we hope to see a lot of pollinator targeted projects.

Something to know about the LIP program is it does not have acreage restrictions.

13-It really just depends on the resources you’re trying to restore or protect. In the history of the program, I’ve seen us work on an urban lot to thousands of acres of West Texas.

Have a project in mind? Find details on the Landowner Incentive Program on the Texas Parks and Wildlife website.

For Texas Parks and Wildlife…I’m Cecilia Nasti.

Monarch butterfly

Ensuring Monarch Survival Play Now | Play in Popup | Download

The Monarch butterfly population is in decline.

06- The current thought is that it’s actually several different factors that are contributing to the decline that we’re seeing.

Ben Hutchins is an invertebrate biologist with Texas Parks and Wildlife.

16- Historically, one of the big issues was deforestation in the forests in a couple of states in Mexico where the monarchs overwinter. We’ve also had really cold weather at those overwintering sites, and also some prolonged [drought and] hot weather up here in the United States.

Butterfly habitat is inadequate along their migration routes. Milkweed plants are the monarch’s preferred nectar and host plants. Citizens who grow milkweed in
their landscapes can help support monarch migration.

17- Those [milkweed] can be used by monarchs. But, we’re really starting to try to push that people are really conscious about which species of milkweed they’re planting. We’re advocating to look at what’s native to your area and plant regional appropriate milkweeds.

Hutchins says we need to plant more than milkweeds; a diversity of plant species will attract more monarchs and other pollinators, and provide them with the food and shelter they need for their long journey.

Find more monarch information on the Texas Parks and Wildlife website.

For Texas Parks and Wildlife…I’m Cecilia Nasti.