Helping farmers support pollinators: Science-based practices driving forage programs

Pollinator declines in agricultural systems are driven by four interacting stressors: parasites, pathogens, pesticides, and poor nutrition – with poor nutrition often intensifying the effects of the others. Project Apis m. helps farmers support pollinators through diverse forage initiatives including the Seeds for Bees® program launched in 2013. This program increases the adoption of flowering cover crops in Californian almond orchards, where 90% of the United State’s honey bee colonies are placed early in the year when forage is scarce. Colonies placed in orchards with early flowering brassica cover crops have shown greater weights and long-term productivity compared to colonies placed in bare orchards. The Seeds for Bees® program continues to increase its impact, having planted 18,659 acres of cover crop in 2024 with half of that acreage coming from seed purchased through the program by prior participants and farmland management groups. The program also collaborates with other organizations including Pollinator Partnership, Blue Diamond Growers cooperative, and American Farmland Trust. Beyond almonds, PAm supports pollinator health in other crop production systems by funding projects to create a pollen phenology wheel, define forage needs, and study interactions among bee species. It also supports studies on the impacts of adverse weather on the nutritional quality of bee forage, and establish
drought-tolerant plantings, which improve pollinator health and diversity, increase soil stability, and mitigate the damaging effect of extreme winds in drought-stricken areas of the American West. Together, these efforts generate practical tools to help farmers
support pollinators under increasingly adverse weather conditions.