Pollinator Week 2024: Pollinator Plant Recommendations for Edisto Island
This year for Pollinator Week (6/17 – 6/23) we’re doing a 7-part series about native pollinators on Edisto Island!
If you’re considering building a pollinator garden, bringing native plants into your yard, or managing land for pollinator habitat, you’re going to need to know which plants work best for Edisto Island. Here, we’re in the borderline subtropics of the Lowcountry, meaning many plant recommendations you’ll find online for the Southeast US often aren’t worth much of anything. However, lucky for you, I’ve spent the better part of the last decade planning, planting, and managing native plant gardens in the Edisto area. So, I’ve got a good handle on what works and what doesn’t here and I know the plants that are specialized to our unique sea island soils and climate. I also spent all of this spring building out a set of slides and a pollinator garden plant recommendation list focused on Edisto Island.
If you’d like to give them a gander, check out the link below:
These plant recommendations of mine are specifically focused on butterflies (because, as a butterfly researcher, I’m biased) but almost all are good for a wide range of our native pollinators. One thing I do want to stress is the importance of using native plants in your pollinator garden, yard, and lawn. Native pollinators are adapted to make use of native plants. Native plants are adapted to our local climate, soils, and wildlife. Native plants, pound for pound, will always be better for our native pollinators and wildlife than any exotic ornamental plant. Further, many ornamental plants, even the ornamental varieties of native plants, have been bred in such a way that they no longer provide all the benefits they should to pollinators. So, plant native and, if you can, plant local ecotypes of native plants. These plants will grow better, require less care, and provide the maximum benefit to our native pollinators and wildlife.
For further information, recommendations, and sources of native plants and seeds, you can also check out the SC Native Plant Society and Xerces Society, both linked below:
https://xerces.org/pollinator-conservation/native-plant-nursery-and-seed-directory
