Since 1986, the Conservation Reserve Program (CRP) has provided millions of acres of vital habitat for honey bees and other pollinators. With abundant acres of legume-rich forage or diverse wildflower plantings, CRP lands offer hives a safe haven from the pressures of modern agriculture—supplying large-scale sources of pollen and nectar that keep bee colonies healthy, and generating millions of dollars’ worth of honey every year. These same CRP lands offer tremendous benefits to native bumble bees and other pollinators that require diverse wildflowers, shrubs, and safe nesting sites.
Reports from MAE studies that measure pollinator benefits are listed below. Click the title to view the report.
Project Reports and Articles
Title | Authors | Year |
Seed Mix Experiments and | Jackson and Meissen | 2019 |
Otto, Zheng, Gallant, Iovanna, Carlson, Smart, and Hyberg | 2018 | |
Smart, Otto, Cornman, and Iwanowicz | 2018 | |
Smart, Otto, Carlson, and Roth | 2018 | |
Wojcik | 2018 | |
Assessing pollinator habitat services to optimize conservation programs (680 KB, PDF) | Iovanna, Ando, Swinton, Hellerstein, Kagan, Mushet, Otto, and Rewa | 2017 |
Otto, O’Dell, Bryant, Euliss, Bush, and Smart | 2017 | |
A Comparison of Honey Bee-Collected Pollen from Working Agricultural Lands Using Light Microscopy and ITS Metabarcoding (497 KB, PDF) | Smart, Cornman, Iwanowicz, McDermott-Kubeczko, Pettis, Spivak, and Otto | 2017 |
Why does bee health matter? The Science surrounding honey bee health concerns and what we can do about it (348 KB, PDF) | Spivak, Browning, Goblirsch, Lee, Otto, Smart, and Wu-Smart | 2017 |
Evaluation of CRP contour buffer and filter strips as habitat for native bees and predatory ground beetles (1 MB, PDF) | Moorhouse | 2016 |
Otto, Roth, Carlson, and Smart | 2016 | |
Cornman, Otto, Iwanowicz, and Pettis | 2015 |