"Matchmaker, Matchmaker,
Make me a match,
Find me a find,
catch me a catch."
--Fiddler on the Roof
It was great to see pollinators being matched with plants at the mini-festival hosted by The Hive, Woodland, on May 3 on what was supposed to be the date of the 2025 California Honey Festival. Worried about the threat of a major rainstorm, the organizers of the California Honey Festival postponed it until June 21. The Hive offered a public mini-celebration. (See news story)
The matchmaker at the mini-festival was Grace Loeffelholz, a UC Davis student in the "Learning by Leading" porgram directed by Rachel Davis, GATEWAS horticulturist with the UC Davis Arboretum and Public Garden..
Loeffelholz stood by a gigantic board, which included images of a soap plant (genus Chlorogalum), milkweed (genus Asclepias), California golden poppy (genus Eschscholzia) and yarrow (genus Achillea). Above the plants were four pollinators: a monarch, bumble bee, syrphid fly and a Sphinx moth.
Can you match the pollinators with the plants?
If you're a gardener, you've probably observed most of these pollinators, but can you match them?
Okay, the answers:
Monarch: Milkweed. That's the host plant.
Bumble Bee: California golden poppy (two natives)
Syrphid Fly: Yarrow (the fly also hangs out on a lot of other plants)
Sphinx Moth: The soap plant.
Cheers!