Native Plants and Pollinators on the Kerr Ranch and Farm

The Kerr Center is conserving habitat for native pollinators (native bees, wasps, flies, butterflies, moths, beetles, hummingbirds, etc.) and is establishing pollinator-friendly landscapes using native plants.

We also sponsor educational events to teach others how to create pollinator-friendly gardens and landscapes.

Check out our native plant and pollinator library for information on growing native plants and identifying native pollinators!

Why? With the ongoing decline in numbers of honeybee colonies, we need native pollinators to provide pollination of food crops. (See Native Pollinator FAQs.)

But native pollinators also face threats from many sources, including insecticides, intensive farming/ranching practices, and urban development.

Other pollinators, such as the monarch butterfly, are in danger of extinction. Oklahoma provides crucial habitat for this beloved butterfly.

Milkweeds and other native plants are not only essential for monarchs, they provide food and nesting for native bees and other insects which provide billions of dollars worth of “pollination services” each year.

While native pollinator habitat has been studied and promoted in different regions of the United States, limited work has been done in the eastern Oklahoma region. We are helping to fill that gap!

Additional pollinator resources online:

• USDA-NRCS’ Pollinators and Insects page and Monarch Butterflies page
• U.S. Fish & Wildlife Service’s “Save the Monarch Butterfly” page
• Track the monarch migration in real time, and log your own observations, at the Journey North website.

News/Tips and Recent Publications

Learn About: Pollinators and Native Plants

Habitat for Pollinators & a Conservation Innovation Grant from USDA

With help from a Conservation Innovation Grant from the USDA Natural Resource Conservation Service (NRCS) awarded in 2011, and in partnership with the Xerces Society, the Kerr Center is working to

1) Implement plantings at the Kerr Center Ranch to use in outdoor classrooms for students, teachers and NRCS employees to learn proper planting, plant identification, and management techniques for native pollinator habitat.

Plantings focus on plants native to Eastern Oklahoma and those associated with native pollinators.

2) Install a stabilized stream crossing point within the riparian area native pollinator habitat, to demonstrate the establishment of native pollinator habitat within a working ranch program.

”I applied for the native pollinator grant from the USDA’s NRCS out of concern for the problems honeybees were experiencing. Also, the drastic decline in bumblebee populations is a cause for concern,” says David Redhage, Director of Ranch Operations.

The 4,000 acres of the Kerr Ranch offer a wide diversity of habitats for native plants and the pollinators attracted to them.

Since 2011, we have established native plants in pastures, in horticulture plots, and in landscape beds . We have photo-documented these plants and the pollinators that visit them.