Pollinator Gardening for the South

Book excerpt: This step-by-step guide will answer all of your questions about how to create beautiful gardens designed to welcome beneficial pollinators across the South. Combining up-to-date scientific information with artful design strategies, Danesha Seth Carley and Anne M. Spafford teach gardeners of all levels to plan, plant, and maintain successful pollinator gardens at home and in shared community sites. Everyday gardeners, along with farmers, scientists, and policy makers, share serious concerns about ongoing declines in bee and other pollinator populations, and here Spafford and Carley deliver great news: every thoughtfully designed garden, no matter how small, can play a huge role in providing the habitat, nourishment, and nesting places so needed by pollinators. This book explains all you need to be a pollinator champion. *Covers USDA hardiness zones 6, 7, 8, and 9, including twelve southern states *Explains what makes pollinators happy—bees, for sure, and many others, great and small *Brings science and art together in gardens of all types, including urban, food, container, community, school, and large-scale gardens *Provides step-by-step instructions for choosing locations, preparing soil and garden beds, selecting the best plants, considering seasonality in your garden design, managing your garden throughout the year, and much more *Richly illustrated with photographs, design plans, and handy charts and lists