Citizen Scientist Bee Pollination Project Training

If you farm or garden small fruits and vegetables and would like to participate in a citizen science program to monitor bees and pollination, please see the information below.

An hour-long training with Eli Bloom is scheduled for Tuesday, June 6th, from 5:30-6:30 p.m. at the WSU Extension office in Elma (32 Elma-McCleary Road/County Fairgrounds). Eli is a PhD candidate in the Department of Entomology at WSU. You must register to attend: https://nwpollinators.org/citizen-science/registration-for-polycultures-and-pollinators/

The research:
Polycultures and Pollinators: Can boosting crop diversity support pollination by wild bees?

Diversified farming practices such as inter-cropping and multi-cropping have been shown to increase the diversity of wild bees on farms. However, little is known about if that increase in wild bee diversity promotes pollination. Polycultures and Pollinators, a new citizen science study from the Department of Entomology at Washington State University (WSU), seeks to examine the role of intentionally increasing crop diversity to boost plant productivity in small-scale farming systems and urban gardens.
In this citizen science project, small-scale growers and gardeners are invited to take part in a regional survey of wild bees and pollination. Farmers and gardeners will have the opportunity to attend a 1-hour training session on the methods used for this project, set out traps once a year and collect a small amount of fruit set data from sentinel plants provided by the project team. If you are interested in this new citizen science project, you can register at the link given below!