Danielle Olsen (June 2016)

August Drop-in 2016: Bumblebee Gardens

This Drop-In Intern Interpretation activity would be designed to allow visitors the chance to make their own bumblebee garden while learning about why bees are important and how we can help protect them.

Danielle Olsen (June 2016)

Guiding Questions:

What is a bumble bee? What makes Bumblebees important to us?

How can we help save the bumblebees?

What kinds of flowers should I plant to help save the bees? Why?

Materials: Plastic Water Bottles

Scissors

Black and Yellow Sharpies

White Foam Sheets

Googly Eye Stickers

Craft Glue

Tape

Pipe Cleaners

Pom Poms

Potting Soil

Native flower seeds; geraniums, asters, sunflowers

Take Home Sheets

Setup:

Project could easily be set up in either create spaces or art nook. Table cloths would be necessary to contain the potential messiness of the planting soil.

Process:

Visitors would be invited to take a water bottle bottom and color it yellow and black with sharpies to mimic the stripes of the bee. Visitors can then decorate the bottle to look like a bumblebee. White foam sheets will be available to cut out wings, pompoms and pipe cleaners will be available for antennas and finally googly eye stickers will also be available. These pieces can be either glued on or taped on, whichever the visitor prefers. The final step will be to fill their completed bumble bee garden with potting soil and seeds.

Danielle Olsen (June 2016)

Connections to Sizing It Up: Scale: Such a small insect, the bumble bee, makes a very large impact on our lives.

Resources:

On Bumble bees:

https://bumblebeeconservation.org/get-involved/bumble-kids/

http://www.buzzaboutbees.net/honey-bee-deaths-do-they-matter.html

http://www.bumblebee.org/helpbees.htm

Bumblebees:

The Bumblebee is a widely distributed social insect known for its ability to collect nectar from flowers and pollinate plants. Bumblebees are large yellow and black flying insects with a distinct buzz. There is variation in coloration among bumblebees and some species have bands of red, yellow and black. They have stocky bodies that are covered with many hairs to which pollen adheres.

Bumblebees have four wings. The two rear wings are small and usually attached to the fore wings by a row of hooks called hamuli. The wings move rapidly, at 130-240 beats per second.

Bumblebees are beneficial insects. The bumblebee's commercial value is as a pollinator of crops.

How can we help the Bumblebees?:

Bumblebees need three things:

1. A continuous succession of flowers supplying nectar and pollen throughout the season

2. A warm, sheltered, usually south facing, place to nest

3. A secure place for the queens to hibernate

Bumblebee Food:

Bumblebees drink nectar and eat pollen - nothing else, so flowers are needed for feeding. It has been estimated that a full “honey stomach” will give a bumblebee about 40 minutes of flying time. Without the energy in nectar a bumblebee cannot fly. If a bumblebee cannot fly it cannot reach flowers to get nectar - it will die.

Why are we planting geraniums, asters, sunflowers?:

These flowers provide a good source of pollen for bumblebees, you can hear them gathering pollen from some flowers as they sonicate the anthers to dislodge the pollen. Normally these flowers provide a large amount of nectar per flower and so they are very useful for helping the bees.