Pollinator Week Partner Spotlight: Dyck Arboretum of the Plains The Dyck Arboretum of the Plains in Hesston, Kansas carries out a mission to cultivate transformative relationships between people and the land. The bio-regions gardens at Dyck Arboretum featuring blooming Echinacea pallida (pale purple coneflower), Penstemon digitalis (foxglove), Baptisia australis, var. minor (blue false indigo), and Yucca glauca (soapweed). Photo by: Brad Guhr Pollinator habitat featuring flowering and hybridizing Echinacea pallida/E. paradoxa (coneflowers), and Parthenium integrifolium (wild quinine) in the foregound and Penstemon digitalis (foxglove) in the background. Photo by: Brad Guhr A growing patch of Asclepias syriaca (common milkweed) provides both larval food for monarchs as well as nectar for many other insects. In turn, predators are finding food, munching on pollinators as well! Photo by: Brad Guhr Echinacea pallida (pale purple coneflower) blooms along the pond edge, hosting this nectar-sipping monarch. This tall, water’s edge habitat also supports a variety of insects, small mammals, birds, amphibians and reptiles. Photo by: Brad Guhr A Monarch Butterfly nectars on Pale Purple Coneflower. Photo by: Brad Guhr Dyck Arboretum staff use native plant gardens to train teachers in the Earth Partnership for Schools (EPS) Program. Photo by: Brad Guhr Catching insects. Photo by: Brad Guhr Collecting data. Photo by: Brad Guhr Through the Earth Partnership for Schools (EPS) Program, these teachers will engage their students in the hands-on process of landscaping with native plants, creating environmental education learning laboratories, and attracting biological diversity to their school grounds. Photo by: Brad Guhr Teachers planting native plants in a shade garden at Dyck Arboretum of the Plains. They are participating in the 2021 Earth Partnership for Schools summer institute training. They learn how to restore native plant gardens on school grounds so that they can eventually do the same with their students. Photo by: Brad Guhr Learning about some of the native plants found at Dyck Arboretum. Photo by: Brad Guhr
