Bee Better: How You Can Support Pollinators in Your Own Backyard

Honeybee collecting pollen from a flower.

By: Jesse Clark

Start with this: no bees, no blueberries. No squash, no tomatoes, no wild strawberries tucked between grasses at the edge of a trail. Pollinators, especially bees, are the quiet architects of our food systems, and their numbers are dropping fast. Maryland’s native species are disappearing from fields, forests, and neighborhood gardens—not all at once, but steadily, in ways that are easy to miss until the blooms go quiet. You don’t need a sprawling farm to make a difference. Whether you plant a few wildflowers, change how you garden, or even take up beekeeping, the solutions start close to home.

Plant Native Wildflowers

Skip the impatiens and marigolds. If you want to help pollinators thrive in Maryland, plant wildflowers that are native to your region. These plants (think wild bergamot, eastern columbine, or golden ragwort) aren’t just pretty, they’re perfectly matched to the seasonal rhythms and dietary needs of local bee species. They bloom when bees need them, produce nectar that makes sense metabolically, and require little to no babying once established. It’s a low-maintenance, high-reward way to get your hands dirty.

Provide Nesting Sites

Most native bees don’t live in hives. They’re solitary, quiet workers that need dead wood, dry stems, or bare patches of soil to lay their eggs. That’s where you come in. By letting part of your garden go a little wild or adding a bee hotel to your yard, you provide nesting resources to an increasingly fragmented habitat. Just make sure to place those bee hotels out of the wind and rain and keep them clean to avoid disease build-up. This kind of unmanicured approach might feel odd at first, but the bees couldn’t care less about tidy edges.

Avoid Pesticides

It seems obvious, and yet people still reach for the spray bottle at the first sign of a blemished leaf. But if you’re aiming to help pollinators, you must remove pesticides from your lawn and garden routine. Most pesticides—yes, even the ones labeled “natural”—pose serious risks to bee health. They affect not just the bees directly exposed but also future generations through contaminated nectar and pollen. Instead, encourage biodiversity to fight pests naturally, or get familiar with hand-picking and squishing. As Cornell’s impact center explains, healthy gardens start with healthy pollinators.

Support Local Beekeepers

Not everyone wants to tend hives, and that’s perfectly reasonable. But that doesn’t mean you can’t be part of the cycle. Buy your honey, wax wraps, or pollen from folks who keep bees responsibly. By choosing to purchase sustainable honey from local beekeepers, you put money back into systems that value the pollinators’ well-being over industrial efficiency. Ask questions at your farmer’s market, look for minimal processing, and don’t be afraid of honey that crystallizes—that’s how you know it’s real. The Maryland State Beekeepers Association even keeps a list of trusted producers.

Start a Beekeeping Business

Beekeeping might sound scary, but in truth, it’s a thriving, modern pursuit with real economic potential. With a few hives, a little space, and the right know-how, you can harvest honey, render beeswax, and cut beautiful slabs of honeycomb for sale. There’s even a growing demand for local pollination services, especially in fruit-heavy regions like central Maryland. According to this list of green business ideas, beekeeping checks all the boxes: it’s eco-conscious, scalable, and community-oriented. Plus, there’s something almost meditative about working with bees.

Educate Others

Conservation doesn’t stop with you. Once you’ve learned how to build a bee-friendly garden, share that knowledge with your neighborhood, school, or community group. Host a pollinator day at your local park or give away seed packets with instructions for planting. Invite people to tour your native garden, mistakes and all. The Central Maryland Beekeepers Association even encourages residents to volunteer in pollinator outreach efforts, which can be a great way to meet like-minded folks. The more you demystify the process, the less intimidating it becomes for someone else to jump in. The movement grows when you speak up.

The Buzz Starts With You

Saving bees isn’t about grand gestures or massive campaigns. It’s about what you do with your own two hands and the ten square feet you call yours. Whether that’s planting Joe-Pye weed, skipping the lawn spray, or selling jars of backyard honey, the impact multiplies. You’re helping something ancient, essential, and exquisitely vulnerable find its footing again. And once you start paying attention to the bees, it becomes impossible not to care about everything else they touch. The buzz, as it turns out, is just the beginning.

Begin a journey of discovery at Charlotte’s Quest Nature Center, where every trail leads to a new adventure and a deeper connection with the natural world!

Jesse Clark is a traveler, so she’s no stranger to experiencing wanderlust and that strong desire to travel. She created Soulful Travel because she believes that travel is good for the soul.

The Impact of Invasive Species on Our Trails

As winter approaches and nature slows down, some unwelcome visitors remain persistently active—our region's invasive species. These plants, animals, and insects are not part of our local ecosystem and can have a serious impact on the health of our nature trails. When left unchecked, invasive species crowd out native plants, alter habitats, and make it harder for wildlife to thrive.

In Maryland, some of the most aggressive invasive species include Japanese stiltgrass (Microstegium vimineum), multiflora rose (Rosa multiflora), and tree-of-heaven (Ailanthus altissima). Japanese stiltgrass, a grass with a quick-spreading nature, takes over forest floors, shading out native wildflowers. Multiflora rose, a thorny shrub, creates dense thickets that can choke out other vegetation. Tree-of-heaven, recognizable by its rapid growth and long compound leaves, releases chemicals that suppress nearby plants, making it particularly problematic in forests and along trails.

These invasive plants reduce biodiversity by crowding out native species that support local wildlife. For instance, Japanese stiltgrass and tree-of-heaven don’t provide the same food and shelter for Maryland’s native animals as local plants would, which disrupts the balance of our ecosystems.

The good news? By learning to identify and manage invasive species, we can work together to protect our trails and support the health of our ecosystems. At the nature center, we’re committed to this mission through regular maintenance and volunteer efforts. We’re grateful to the community members who help us remove invasive species and restore native plants on our trails. If you’re interested in learning more about invasive species or want to join us in our trail stewardship efforts (especially if you'd like to adopt an area of the park), reach out to our team! Every effort helps to make our nature trails a safe and healthy place for people, plants, and animals alike.

Settling in for a Long Winter's Nap

Hibernation is when an animal slows its heart rate and other bodily functions to save energy and survive the winter without eating much. Some animals just slow down and move less frequently during hibernation, but others go into what appears to be a deep sleep and don’t wake up until spring. Contrary to popular belief, hibernation is not actual sleep, though. Hibernation is a state of torpor, different from sleep, mainly because during sleep, unconscious bodily functions — such as breathing, having a heart rate, and having detectable brain activity — are still performed. Different animals hibernate in different ways- some appear to be in a deep sleep they won’t “wake” from for months, while others only take light naps, waking to eat and shiver to warm up a bit.

In Maryland, we have many animals that hibernate during winter. When the weather grows cold and the food becomes scare. American black bears retreat to dens. Males bed down around mid-December and emerge in mid-March; females, from late November to mid-April. Groundhogs, also called woodchucks, are typically active until the first real frost of winter, often October or November. Then they crawl down into their burrows to hibernate until February or March. Wood frogs find shelter and warmth during Winter under fallen leaves, pine needles and soil. Wood frogs typically only hibernate for 2-3 months during winter. Garter snakes hibernate from late October through March or early April, but do take breaks to bask on rocks during mild winter days. They hibernate in natural cavities, such as rodent burrows, under rock piles, or in stumps.

On November 4 at 7pm, members are invited to join us for our First Friday Fire to talk more about hibernating animals. As always, we’ll enjoy an evening around the fire and s’mores. You can register for this evening event at the park for free on our website.

While many animals in our region will be hibernating through the upcoming winter months, there are still plenty to see! Learn more winter wildlife in our area from the Chesapeake Bay Program.