Athena Rayne Anderson

This content is based on a post originally published on June 6, 2011, on my blog “Pollinators Info” (no longer online).

Have you ever looked at the miles of mowed grass on the side of the highway and thought, “what a waste of space!”? I have, and I’m not alone. Several states have Department of Transportation projects that have turned these green wastelands into beautiful pollinator habitat. Pollinators benefit by having miles of unbroken flowers to visit. The DOT benefits by lowering their maintenance costs.

Won’t those pollinators be hit by cars? What about other wildlife? These are common questions.

Here’s how it works

• First, the DOT sows a seed mix containing perennial flowers and grasses native to their area.
• Native plants usually out-compete non-natives, so the need for spraying herbicides to control invasives is decreased or eliminated.
• The prairie-like habitat is maintained by mowing once or twice a year, instead of once a month for grassy medians in the growing season of some states. This decreases the costs of labor, gas, and time for highway maintenance. Native plants are also more drought-resistant and require less water than non-natives, so the median is appealing to passersby without needing fertilizers or irrigation.
• Studies have shown that pollinators are NOT more likely to get killed by traffic after flower mixes are established (neither are deer or other mammals). This seems counterintuitive, but actually makes sense from the standpoint of the pollinators. A highway median extending for several miles could support entire populations of many species of native bees- the food and nest sites are so abundant within the median that the bees rarely cross the highway!
• Growers and gardeners near these new pollinator habitats benefit from increased crop pollination too!
• Pollinator habitat can also be established in utility rights-of-way and solar panel fields with the same benefits.

Check out the Xerces Society guide Managing Roadsides and Rights-of-Way for Pollinators for more information.

Featured image copyright Jonathan Cutrer, April 13, 2019 CC-BY 2.0

Download and use of images from this site is a violation of copyright law and legal action will be pursued, unless permission has been granted by the author. All images are copyright Athena Rayne Anderson unless otherwise stated.