J Schwanke’s Life In Bloom

>> "J Schwanke's Life in Bloom" is brought to you by... Albertsons Companies... with additional support from the following... CalFlowers... Dollar Tree... Sunshine Bouquet.

>> Today on "Life in Bloom," we're all about pollinators and pollination.

Bees, birds, hummingbirds, butterflies, dragonflies, and even bats all have critical functions that contribute to growing flowers and food.

We'll learn what they do and discover ways to assist them in their vital activities.

I'm J Schwanke.

Welcome to "Life in Bloom."

Who doesn't love watching pollinators winging around the garden?

Butterflies and moths flit from bloom to bloom... Dragonflies gathering the rays of the sun...

The buzzing sound of a nearby bee as it collects nectar...

The fleeting presence of a hummingbird at your planters... With sharp declines in some of their populations in recent years, pollinators have become somewhat of a buzzword.

See what I did there?

But let's review their purpose.

Pollinators are any animal, primarily insects, but sometimes birds or even mammals, such as bats, that fertilize plants and pollinate flowers, resulting in the formation of seeds and fruit surrounding seeds.

Humans and other animals rely on pollinators to produce nuts and fruits and are essential components of a healthy diet.

Pollinators are necessary for three-quarters of our food crops.

While some plants and crops are pollinated by wind, the majority of flowering-plant species found worldwide require animal-mediated pollination to make the seeds that will become the next generation of plants.

Without pollinators, we wouldn't have flowers or food, for that matter.

Bees, butterflies, dragonflies, hummingbirds, and even bats provide essential service in pollinating everything, from apples to agave.

When you're chowing down on your favorite fruit or vegetable or arranging or smelling your favorite flower, you can thank a pollinator.

When these helpful pollinators venture inside a flower, they help flowers produce fruit, create seeds, or allow flowers to multiply or even cross-pollinate to create stronger or better plants.

Let's look inside a flower and see how pollination occurs.

A lily gives us a beautiful example of all the different parts of a flower.

We're all familiar with the stem and of course the leaves that lead to the flower.

And there's the petals.

But in the middle is where all the action happens.

We've got the stamen, which is made up of the filament and the anther that holds the pollen.

As the pollen progresses, it gets airborne, or bees or butterflies might come by, and those pieces of pollen come up and get attached to the stigma.

The stigma is the top of the ovary that leads all the way down to the ovule, where the seeds are made.

As that pollen touches this stigma at the top, it travels down, and pollination of the seeds happen.

And the seeds are formed inside the ovary.

So, the pollen is where it all happens.

That's where reproduction starts.

We're used to removing those little pieces of pollen so that they won't stain our tablecloth or stain our clothing.

And by removing that pollen, we can actually make the lily last longer because pollination never truly starts.

Just like a baby that's inside the womb and forming inside its mother, all of these pieces and parts are forming inside this great, little bud as it starts out on the stem.

Every flower has a reproductive system inside.

And each one is a little bit different.

The tulip has all of those same pieces and parts.

It just looks different, and they're positioned differently.

But inside, under that stigma, there's an ovary where the seeds are forming.

I grew up in my family's greenhouse raising carnations, and carnations have one of the most graphic interiors.

Inside there, you can pop out that ovary.

And you can pop it open with your knife to see the seeds on the inside.

It's a really good example of seeing those little, tiny seeds forming on the inside of a flower.

Roses have a similar reproductive system inside.

If we remove the petals, we can see the pollen on the inside.

We consider that to be a beautiful part of a garden rose, when it opens all the way to the center.

And we've got all of those little, tiny stamens with filaments and anthers that are all surrounding the ovary that's inside the center of the calyx itself.

As pollination occurs, that will swell up, and we're used to seeing rose hips in the fall.

The rose hips are caused by the swelling of the seeds inside the ovule.

There's also other flowers that are composite flowers.

A hydrangea has separate inflorescence, and each one of these individual flowers that make up the hydrangea have their own reproductive system inside.

A gerber daisy has a very decorative area for the filaments and the stamens, all surrounding that center and all creating pollen.

Even a delphinium has reproductive systems inside each one of the flowers.

I'm here with beekeeper Jason to learn more about honeybees.

Thanks for having us out here to meet your friends.

>> Well, it's a pleasure.

I can't wait to show you.

>> Awesome.

Well, I'm excited.

Let's learn some more about bees.

>> Right.

>> So, Jason, how did you decide, "Oh, I'm gonna be a beekeeper"?

>> I was going to law school, and I needed something to kind of fill the hours outside of studying, and so, I looked into it, watched a lot of videos and took some classes on it and decided to jump in.

And so, I got a beehive, and I've been keeping ever since.

It's been about seven years now.

And this is just a chance for me to kind of reconnect with nature and do something tangible with my hands, and I really take a lot of satisfaction from it.

>> Tell us a little bit about the process, what you do to get honey into that jar.

>> Sure.

I mean, my main job as a beekeeper is to try and stay out of the way of the bees as much as possible.

They tend to know what's best, and they tend to know what they want.

All I'll do is get in there every few weeks, see how they're doing health-wise.

If I see a problem, I can take steps to correct it, either with a treatment for a pest or some kind of invasive creature.

>> Mm-hmm.

>> Mice can get in the hives.

I would get those out.

Really, I'm just kind of a caretaker for the bees to let them do their own thing.

>> What allows you to get in there with them?

Do you do smoke?

Do you do...?

>> So, the smoke is really a distraction.

If they start paying too much attention to me and start to perceive me as a threat, I will use the smoke to basically turn them away and get them focused on something else.

But, ideally, if I'm going slow and careful, I can get in these hives, do what I need to do without hurting any bees, without them really even being concerned with me.

And they'll leave me alone if I'm doing everything right.

>> One queen here?

I mean, how many hives do you have?

Is there just one queen in this area right now, or is there more?

>> So, ideally, there is one queen per hive.

>> Okay.

>> There can be issues arise when a colony gets too big, or if there's other health issues going on.

There might be multiple queens in there.

But, by and large, every colony here has one queen in it, and she lays all the eggs for the entire colony.

>> So, there are six individual hives here.

Some are taller.

Some are shorter.

>> That's correct.

>> How many bees in a hive?

>> It varies.

>> Okay.

>> In these big ones here, you'd probably see somewhere between anywhere from 60,000 to 100,000 bees in a single hive.

>> Wow!

Wow!

That's amazing.

So, there could be three-quarters of a million bees here.

>> Oh, easily.

>> Wow!

Wow!

Why local honey?

Why do that?

Why get local honey from somebody like you and not buy it at the grocery store?

>> Local honey, say, a large-scale bee farm that is within a few dozen miles of you, is better because it has those pollens in place.

They typically don't filter, and it's also -- you're supporting a local industry.

You know, you're buying local.

And then, at a closer level, for someone like me, where I'm literally a stone's throw from your house, these bees are producing honey from the flowers in your yard.

And so, all of those pollens are ultra-local.

They are coming right from your surrounding environment.

And so, it's a way to have a product that's delicious and wholesome and also is directly connected to the place where you live.

>> If I want to do something great for bees, what should I plant in my yard?

>> So, a lot of people talk about what flowers and what they should do in their garden.

The best thing that you can do for bees is to plant an American linden, a tree.

And the reason for that is because trees and the linden in particular creates so much nectar and pollen, which is what the bees need to survive.

It produces more than an acre of clover will.

And so, planting a tree is the number-one thing you can do to support bees and pollinators in your neighborhood.

>> Jason, this was so amazing.

Thank you for sharing this with us.

>> It was my pleasure.

I really enjoyed showing it to you, and I'd like to give you this honey made from these bees right here.

>> Wow!

Local honey.

I love it.

Thanks, Jason.

>> You're welcome.

>> So, let's create a bee-watering station that we can set anywhere -- on our deck, in the garden, or on our porch.

We've filled up our saucer with marbles, and now we're gonna add water.

The great part about this is it gives the bees somewhere to land so the water isn't so deep that they would drown.

So, it gives them good footing.

But we also have special water.

I pulled this out of the fountain because you want water that has maybe a little bit of moss or is dirty or has algae growing in it because that fragrance will attract the bees.

We want to make sure that we don't have chlorinated water or distilled water.

We want it to have a fragrance and for it to be organic.

So, notice we haven't covered our marbles.

We've just gone up to the very side of them so that the bees can still walk on the marbles and get to the water.

Now it's all set for our pollinators.

Bee hotels are very popular.

It's a wicker item like this that has short pieces of bamboo cut into it.

And you can buy it just like this.

It's got a closed back, and then the bees make their home inside those bamboo pieces.

You hang it in the garden where you have pollinators, and it's a fun way to attract bees and have a little hotel they can live in.

But I thought it would be fun for us to make our own.

So, we have a wooden box like this.

And I had a friend who cut bamboo for me and cut it to 6 inches.

So, that's real simple.

Now, if it's at a joint, that's not gonna do any good.

So, we're gonna put that towards the back, and we'll have the hole in the front go in here.

But now it's easy for us just to add these pieces of bamboo right into our box.

So, now our bee hotel is ready, and we can set it anywhere in the garden so that the bees can make themselves at home.

Container gardens planted with flowers are a great way to assist bees and other pollinators.

Hummingbirds are a beautiful benefit to container gardens filled with flowers in your yard, porch, or deck.

So, let's create our pollinator garden.

I've selected a container and plants that are pollinator-friendly.

This container is a concrete container, but it didn't have holes in the bottom.

So, I used a concrete drill bit to drill holes in the bottom.

Drainage is super-important, and we don't want our plants to sit in water or get soggy roots.

And then we'll add gravel.

Got a nice layer of gravel inside there.

And we'll cover that with soil.

One of the best things about planting gardens is the fact that you can get the dirt under your fingernails.

But it's also a scientifically proven fact that there's microbes in the soil that act as antidepressants when they get under our fingernails.

So, physically, working outside and digging in the dirt is gonna cause us to feel happier and less depressed.

It's a great benefit that comes along with planting flowers in the yard.

So, I'm gonna start with salvia.

I'm gonna use that as the anchor in the center.

It'll be our tallest plant, and then our other plants are gonna go around the outside.

I love heliotrope.

[ Sniffs ] When I was a kid, there was a company that made a heliotrope cologne, and I loved it.

So, having heliotrope is a really good pollinator attractor.

The pollinators are just gonna come to that heliotrope and spend a lot of time there.

We're gonna use lantana, as well.

It's a childhood favorite of mine, too.

And notice how I'm putting the yellow ones next to the purple.

Those are complementary colors.

So, they're gonna cause excitement.

Got some coreopsis.

We'll add that on the other side.

Got some calibrachoa.

And, again, remember -- when your plants have some roots like this, go ahead and just tear those roots loose a little bit.

That's gonna help those dig into the soil more, and they're gonna be better all summer long.

I'm gonna put that up here because the calibrachoa is actually gonna get long and pendulous off the front.

Remember that our pollinators love bright colors.

So, adding those bright colors inside here -- it's not only pretty for us to look at, but it's gonna attract attention, too.

Making sure we get all that dirt under our fingernails so we get those health-and-wellness benefits.

Then we're gonna go back in and add our soil over the top.

Want to make sure that we fill in between each of those plants with plenty of soil.

Now we'll put this in place and make sure that we water it in.

What you want to make sure you do is that you water it thoroughly on all sides all the way around and make sure that the water comes out the bottom.

That way you've saturated the entire root ball, and it's gonna hold onto that water.

Also, don't let these plants get bone-dry, because when they get bone-dry, you have to rehydrate the entire ball again.

My dad always joked, "Water them the day before they wilt."

Remember to check it with your finger, and you'll be able to see what that moisture content is in that soil.

When it starts to get a little dry to the touch, like it is right now, before we've watered it, we'll go ahead and give it a nice soaking.

Then, wait and come back and water it when it gets dry again.

My other favorite thing is to deadhead.

I love that.

It's almost therapeutic.

And what I'll do is, once the flowers are spent, I'll go through and break those off and just pick them out of there.

Then, what will happen is that will force the plants to bloom more, and we'll have a beautiful container garden all summer long, with lots and lots of pollinators.

Choose flowers that are pollinator-friendly.

Your local nursery can direct you to pollinator favorites.

They may even have native flowers that attract bees and other pollinators.

Bright colors help attract butterflies and hummingbirds, too.

Place your container garden where you can safely see and observe the pollinators in action.

Remember to deadhead.

Removing spent blooms encourages your plants to keep blooming.

This keeps new, fresh flowers, nectar, and vibrant colors coming all summer long.

Verbena bonariensis is commonly known as "tall purples," "purple top," or "Brazilian verbena."

Tall purples are native to tropical South America.

They attract butterflies, bumblebees, giant swallowtails, honeybees, hummingbird moths, hummingbirds, and more.

Blooms are fragrant in lavender to rose-purple flowers.

Tall purples are fast-growing in colder zones.

They have a long blooming period, which can be extended with deadheading.

Tall purples are drought-tolerant, with below-average water needs.

Cut flowers can attract pollinators the same way your container gardens can.

Arranging pollinator-friendly flowers in a vase can provide another way to attract beneficial pollinators to your outdoor living spaces.

[ Insects buzzing ] [ Birds chirping ] Honey is an appropriate ingredient in this week's cocktail, the Queen Bee.

We'll start with a shaker full of ice and add 2 ounces of bourbon and an ounce of Amontillado sherry.

We'll add a few dashes of bitters.

We'll add an ounce of thyme-honey syrup.

Then, we'll squeeze a quarter of a fresh lemon over the ice.

We'll shake and pour into the glass and garnish with a lemon wedge.

This Queen Bee is a delicious cocktail.

And trust me -- it's got quite a sting.

We hope this episode allows you to embrace bees and other pollinators for their helpful actions on behalf of all of us.

There may be no better examples of living a life in bloom.

Until next time, I'm J Schwanke.

>> And they'll leave me alone if I'm doing everything right.

>> Do they get familiar with you?

I mean, is it like, "Oh, that's Jason.

It's okay."

>> To me, personally, no, because you have to remember.

These bees live very short life-spans.

>> Oh, okay.

>> During the summer months here, a worker bee will live only from about four to six weeks and then die.

So, what the trick is when inspecting a colony is to act as little like a bear as possible because a bear is a natural predator to honeybees.

>> Okay, right.

>> They will get in there, and they will tear it apart, and they'll eat the honey.

So, as long as I'm not doing that, as long as I'm behaving in a way where I'm walking smoothly and slowly, they'll leave me alone.

>> Wow.

That's amazing.

Huh!

"J Schwanke's Life in Bloom" is filmed in Grand Rapids, Michigan.

>> "J Schwanke's Life in Bloom" is brought to you by... Albertsons Companies... with additional support from the following... CalFlowers... Dollar Tree... Sunshine Bouquet.

Closed-caption funding provided by Holland America Flowers.

For everything flowers, recipes, projects, and more information, visit ubloom.com.