skip to main content
skip to newscasts

Monday, March 18, 2024

Public News Service Logo
facebook instagram linkedin reddit youtube twitter
view newscast page
play newscast audioPlay

SD public defense duties shift from counties to state; SCOTUS appears skeptical of restricting government communications with social media companies; Trump lawyers say he can't make bond; new scholarships aim to connect class of 2024 to high-demand jobs.

view newscast page
play newscast audioPlay

The SCOTUS weighs government influence on social media, and who groups like the NRA can do business with. Biden signs an executive order to advance women's health research and the White House tells Israel it's responsible for the Gaza humanitarian crisis.

view newscast page
play newscast audioPlay

Midwest regenerative farmers are rethinking chicken production, Medicare Advantage is squeezing the finances of rural hospitals and California's extreme swing from floods to drought has some thinking it's time to turn rural farm parcels into floodplains.

Want to Help Save the World? It’s All About Bees and Butterflies

play audio
Play

Friday, October 20, 2017   

SACRAMENTO, Calif. - Monarch butterflies have declined by 90 percent over 20 years, felled by pesticides, parasites and loss of habitat. They're considered a sentinel species, whose fate mirrors that of many insects.

Now, backers of a program to greatly expand all pollinators' range say it's about two-thirds of the way to its goal of establishing a million "pollinator gardens" by the end of the year. The National Pollinator Garden Network has registered 650,000 gardens across the U.S. designed to attract bees and butterflies.

Mary Phillips, the senior director of the National Wildlife Federation's "Garden for Wildlife" program, says homeowners, businesses and cities are all planting flowers to benefit the pollinators.

"It really does span a terrific range of the types of gardens," she says. "We even have a storybook-themed kids park in California, in Oakland, that created a whole 'Pollinator Posse,' and has woven pollinator gardens throughout their park."

Examples of pollinator-friendly plants include flowering bushes like buckwheat and host plants like milkweed. Phillips says vivid red and blue flowers with a bell shape are especially attractive to hummingbirds. Plants that have a long flowering season, from spring to fall, are ideal.

Kedar Narayan is a 9-year-old Pennsylvania boy that has written a cell phone app - a game called "Pollinator for a Pet" - to teach people about native-plant pollinator gardens. He says kids have a big role to play in this effort.

"I see all the adults, they're doing their part, but I see potential in us kids to do our part too," he says. "And together we can create a new ecosystem - one that will become the United States of Pollinators!"

The National Wildlife Federation says one-third of the food Americans eat is pollinated by bees, butterflies, moths, beetles and certain birds and bats - a cycle that accounts for $29 billion of the nation's food production.


get more stories like this via email

more stories
Corporate partners sign contracts to offer a graduate assistantship and pay the students. In turn, MSU pays the graduate assistant's tuition, fees and salary, so the assistantship is directly tied to the academic experience. (pressmaster/Adobe Stock)

play sound

By Victoria Lim for WorkingNation.Broadcast version by Farah Siddiqi for Missouri News Service reporting for the WorkingNation-Public News Service Col…


Social Issues

play sound

A new report brands Connecticut's tax system as "regressive" for low- to middle-income residents and uses a report from the state to make its point…

Environment

play sound

Backers of a new federal rule said it will increase fairness for livestock and poultry producers, in North Carolina and across the country. The U.S…


A study by the advocacy group Inseparable showed one in five adults said at any given time, they consider their mental health to be either 'fair' or 'poor.' (Adobe Stock)

Health and Wellness

play sound

Mental health care advocates are encouraging federal agencies to adopt a proposed update to regulations which would expand access to psychological car…

Social Issues

play sound

With hotter summers bringing hotter working conditions, the Maryland Department of Labor is implementing a heat stress standard to protect workers …

Social Issues

play sound

By Jimmy Cloutier for OpenSecrets.Broadcast version by Roz Brown for Texas News Service reporting for the OpenSecrets-Public News Service Collaboratio…

Environment

play sound

Recreational fishermen in New England say commercial trawlers are threatening the survival of smaller businesses relying on a healthy stock of Atlanti…

 

Phone: 303.448.9105 Toll Free: 888.891.9416 Fax: 208.247.1830 Your trusted member- and audience-supported news source since 1996 Copyright © 2021