Our Six-Legged Workforce

Nature's Wonderful Symbiotic Relationship

I must begin with a confession: I have an MBA. Sometimes that training in business administration affects how I view and write about nature. Each summer I spend a lot of time on my hands and knees photographing wildflowers and insects. One day, while watching this bee buzz from flower to flower, I began to think of pollination, the moving of pollen, as an essential, life-giving business.

Though wildflowers employ two methods—wind and workers—for moving pollen, most wildflowers depend on workers and must lure the best insects into their six-legged workforce. It turns out that some wildflowers only recruit certain insects, and some pollinators play favorites too and only work for certain flowers. In nature, as in business, it pays to advertise, so flowers use scent, shape, and color to grab a potential worker’s attention. 

Let’s consider color. The most common wildflower colors are white, like Rocky Mountain phlox, and yellow, like arrowleaf balsamroot. Both plants abound in and around Yellowstone. Since most pollinators can detect white and yellow, flowers of those colors employ what you could call a generalist approach to hiring: the more pollen movers the merrier. White and yellow flowers also stay open longer with a night shift; their light colors draw pollinating moths. 

But other flowers are more particular about who climbs inside to work. These specialists take a niche approach to hiring. Pink to red flowers—like Yellowstone’s sticky geraniums and paintbrush—attract fewer pollinators. Butterflies and hummingbirds come to work, but bountiful bees are blind to the beauty of red. They buzz right by unless stopped by something else, perhaps an aroma. The less common green and brown flowers downplay color completely and instead produce a scent that draws wasps and beetles to work.

A wildflower’s shape also determines its workforce. Bees have an unusual ability to distinguish shapes, and are really dependable workers. Busy bees know what they like and stick to it. Time after time, they visit flowers with enlarged lower petals that act as a landing pad. A bee accomplishes her pollination job by wearing and carrying sticky, yellow, pollen grains on her head and body from one flower to the next (worker bees are always female). 

Bell-shaped flowers, such as Old Man’s Whiskers (also known as plumed avens), draw workers with a special skill: contorting their bodies. Bees, for example, can hang upside down inside a bell-shaped flower and vibrate their wings, shaking pollen onto themselves.

Then there are flowers shaped like long tubes that need workers with a special tool: a long tongue. Moths, butterflies, and hummingbirds meet that requirement for employment.

However the work is accomplished, the six-legged workforce helps the employing plant meet its ultimate and essential goal of producing seed and fruit. Of course, the workers don’t know or care that the employer benefits from their efforts. Like most workers, pollinators perform this gig for what they get out of it: in this case, the nectar and pollen they need to feed themselves and their young. 

Pollination is just one of nature’s wonderful and practical symbiotic relationships. And we sure benefit: One-third of food produced in North America—including nearly 100 varieties of fruits and vegetables such as almonds, avocados, cranberries, and apples—depends on pollination.  

Sadly though, our nation’s six-legged workforce is in danger. Pollinators suffer from pesticides, loss of habitat, invasive plant and animal species, diseases, parasites, and climate change.

Consider what’s happening to bees. Serious declines have been documented in both managed honeybee colonies and wild bee populations. One study found that nearly half of all regions in North America where bumblebees had been recorded in an earlier period no longer had bees in a more recent period. 

Such news about the die-off of our six-legged workforce can dishearten and discourage. But as with so many big problems, there are little steps each of us can take to help. Whenever Mary and I consider planting a flower, shrub, or tree, whether in the ground or in a pot, we research whether the planting will attract and nourish bees and butterflies (and birds, too, but that’s a story for another time). If so, we plant and then sit back and enjoy watching our six-legged workforce stay employed.

Thanks for joining me in this Love the Wild! If you haven’t yet subscribed, I hope you’ll do so. It’s free and brings a Love the Wild letter to your inbox each week. You’ll enjoy a variety of podcasts, photo essays, opinion pieces, excerpts from my books, and more. With each I hope to warm your heart and excite your mind as we share moments with wildlife and in wild lands.

I write, speak, and photograph to protect wildlife and wild lands. My bestselling In the Temple of Wolves; its sequel, Deep into Yellowstone; and its prequel, The Wilds of Aging are available signed. My books are also available on Amazon unsigned or as eBook or audiobook.

Learn how you can help pollinators.

Photo Credits: All photos by Rick Lamplugh

Are you interested in learning about the past, present, and future of wolves in the Lower 48? If so, please check out my blog. My posts there discuss wolf (and bison) issues in depth. And I also provide links to actions you can take to help protect wolves or learn more.