A study took place in The Catskill Center’s Thorne Preserve over the past five years. The idea was to chart the Woodstock site’s bat and insect populations in light of reported declines in both throughout the Northeast. The study found a surprising number of creatures, especially among the preserve’s insect populations, including butterflies, bees and other pollinators.
“We wanted to take action,” Ellie Reese of the Woodstock Land Conservancy said last week, after announcing the creation of a new website to promote the building of pollinator pathways throughout the town and, hopefully, surrounding communities. “Georgia Asher, one of our members, started working with the idea of bringing back our insect populations and found a group in Connecticut that was already working with what we wanted to do.”
That group, started as an offshoot of a Fairfield County land conservation trust, stressed the need for private homeowners to shift their gardening and lawn activities to promote what they took to calling Pollinator Pathways, an idea that had originated in Washington state last decade. Before the lockdowns came about this past spring, the concept had spread to 35 towns in Connecticut and New York State.
The idea was rather simple: Birds use flyways based on insect populations as much on water. Native plants benefit native insects, providing a host plant for insects to eat and reproduce. Given the fact that most pollinating insects can fly no further than 750 meters, about the length of two football fields, they need safe places to rest and refuel as they make their pollination rounds.
The key to success is to supply the sustenance needed for a pollinator’s rest and refueling with a habitat based on native vegetation rather than on ornamental plants and extensive lawns.
“It’s backyard to backyard,” Reese said. The Woodstock Pollinator Pathway is currently working with 52 homeowners and properties around town. “We help people find the right plant hosts. For caterpillars, say, only milkweed will host a Monarch butterfly. We’re stressing the need for much more than just nectar plants.”
Building on the interest they’ve built hosting lectures, meetings and more recently webinars on pollinators, the Woodstock Land Conservancy has launched an illustrated website called WoodstockNYPollinatorPathway.org, which provides information and resources on plantings. It outlines what needs to occur to create a pathway of closely connected pollinator-friendly areas.
“The WPP’s efforts help create a biologically diverse ecosystem that additionally supports wildlife and our local food system,” the land conservancy’s press release added. The pollinator pathway is a collaborative project of Woodstock Land Conservancy, The Catskill Center, Woodstock NY Transition, The Woodstock Environmental Commission and Community Member Partners.”
Woodstock Transition co-hosted a series of film and discussion events on issues concerning biodiversity, the last of which – in February – served as an informal launch for the Woodstock Pollinator Pathway. The event drew over 150 people. The town’s environmental committee is preparing a resolution to encourage changes in the municipality’s mowing and replanting practices, as well as the town’s use of pesticides.
“We all need to rethink our lawns, the ways in which we mow,” Reese said.
A weekly email update with planting advice on the pollinator pathway is sent out to over 250 people, and future webinars and, when they’re again safe, live events are being planned for the coming weeks and months. “This all started when an expert in moths alerted us to a decline in their populations, then the butterfly people educated us to the relationship between caterpillars and native host plants,” Asher said. “We’ve found people joining us, now, from New Paltz, Saugerties and Kingston. We are hoping to coordinate with the Wallkill Valley Land Trust.”
Pathways become new routes through and beyond the gentrification of a once-thriving natural world. For information, visit WoodstockNYPollinatorPathway.org.
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