Lorraine Johnson - A Garden for the Rusty-Patched Bumblebee: Creating Habitat for Native Pollinators: Ontario and Great Lakes Edition

A Garden for the Rusty-Patched Bumblebee

100 Easy-to-Grow Native Plants for CanadianGardens, 3rd edition (Douglas & McIntyre 2017; 1st edition 1999)

City Farmer: Adventures in Urban Food Growing (Greystone Books 2010)

The Natural Treasures of Carolinian Canada [ed.] (James Lorimer & Co. 2007)

Tending the Earth: A Gardeners Manifesto (Viking 2002)

The New Ontario Naturalized Garden (Whitecap 2001)

Grow Wild! Native Plant Gardening in Canada and the Northern U.S. (Random House 1998)

The Ontario Naturalized Garden: The Complete Guide to Using Native Plants (Whitecap 1995)

The Real Dirt: The Complete Guide to Backyard, Balcony and Apartment Composting, co-authored with Mark Cullen (Penguin 1992)

Green Future: How to Make a World of Difference (Penguin 1990)

Bumble Bees of North America: An Identification Guide by Paul H. Williams, Robbin W. Thorp, Leif L. Richardson, and Sheila R. Colla (Princeton University Press 2014)

Canadas Arctic Marine Atlas (Oceans North Conservation Society 2018)

Bees of Toronto: A Guide to Their Remarkable World (City of Toronto 2016)

Lorraine Johnson and Sheila Colla

illustrations by Ann Sanderson

A Garden
for the
Rusty-Patched Bumblebee

Creating Habitat for Native Pollinators

Ontario and Great Lakes Edition

Text Copyright 2022 Lorraine Johnson & Sheila Colla

Illustrations Copyright 2022 Ann Sanderson

2 3 4 5 6 26 25 24 23 22

All rights reserved. No part of this publication may be reproduced, stored in a retrieval system or transmitted, in any form or by any means, without prior permission of the publisher or, in the case of photocopying or other reprographic copying, a licence from Access Copyright, .

Douglas and McIntyre (2013) Ltd.

P.O. Box 219, Madeira Park, BC , V0N 2H0

www.douglas-mcintyre.com

Edited by Kathy Sinclair

Indexed by Chandan Singh

Text design by Libris Simas Ferraz / Ona Design

Printed and bound in South Korea

Printed on 100 % recycled, FSC -certified paper

Illustration on page vi: Confusing bumblebee (Bombusperplexus) and marsh marigold (Caltha palustris)

Douglas and McIntyre acknowledges the support of the Canada Council for the Arts, the Government of Canada, and the Province of British Columbia through the BC Arts Council.

Library and Archives Canada Cataloguing in Publication

Title: A garden for the rusty-patched bumblebee : creating habitat for native pollinators / Lorraine Johnson and Sheila Colla ; with illustrations by Ann Sanderson.

Names: Johnson, Lorraine, 1960- author. | Colla, Sheila, author. | Sanderson, Ann, illustrator.

Description: Ontario and Great Lakes edition. | Includes index.

Identifiers: Canadiana (print) 20220159289 | Canadiana (ebook) 20220159378 | ISBN 9781771623230 (softcover) | ISBN 9781771623247 ( EPUB )

Subjects: LCSH : Gardening to attract wildlifeOntario, Southern. | LCSH : BeesOntario, Southern. | LCSH : PollinatorsOntario, Southern.

Classification: LCC QL 59 . J 64 2022 | DDC 639.97/579909713dc23

Its not unusual, when gardeners talk about insects, for the word problem to be the next word uttered. The idea that most insects are pests to be eradicated is so deeply entrenched in the gardening world that it takes hard worka basic rethink of approaches and assumptionsto break free of this notion and, instead, to see insects as members of a hugely intricate and intimate community, in relationship with all else.

Yes, we love butterflies! But caterpillars eating our garden plants? Probably not so much. Were starting to value beesbut wasps, ants, aphids, beetles, plant bugs and flies? Its much harder for us to rally around them and to encourage them to visitand make use ofthe gardens we plant and work to protect. And as for celebrating the death and decay that are fundamental to the life of the gardenthe dead leaves, dead plant stalks, dead wood and, indeed, the dead plants that result from any failed attempts to grow themwell, thats something we try to sweep away, out of sight, as quickly as possible.

This book calls on all of us to garden from an entirely different starting point. We are advocating for gardens that actively participate in the natural processes that make all life on earth possibleto see our role as stewards of biodiversity.

What are our personal responsibilities to the land we tend? This question connects inextricably, profoundly, with climate change. The science is clear: habitat loss and fragmentation cause species loss and worsen the effects of climate change. We need to protect remaining habitat, but we also need to create it in places where we have green-paved it with lawns and non-native species. In the face of climate change, we need to create landscapes of resilience: in other words, creating habitat is a climate action.

In this book, were focusing on bees and other pollinators (without them, there would be no life), but theres more to it than that. We want to encourage all of us to see our place in the garden as a place of complexity and questioning, action and inaction, learning and unlearning, honouring and wondering, watching and listening, hoping and trying and maybe failingand then hoping again.

Hopesomething so many of us hold onto for dear lifeis a messy, unfinished word, incomplete without action. We hope you will take the words in this book to heart and into actionto create the spaces in our communities, in our lives, in the places we tend and care for, where pollinators can thrive and bring life to all.

Native, or wild beesthat is, bees that occur naturally within a regionare some of the most misunderstood creatures around. Popular misconceptions are that they all make honey, theyre all black and yellow, they all sting and they all live in hives. But the majority of Ontarios native bees dont live in hives (they are solitary), are not black and yellow (they are a variety of colours, including blue and green!), do not stingand none of them make honey.

There are approximately 860 different bee species in Canada, with more than 350 species in southern Ontario. Types of native bees include bumblebees, sweat bees, mining bees, cuckoo bees, leafcutter bees and cellophane bees, among others. And there are more to discover. In 2010, bee expert Dr. Jason Gibbs found a species