Lincoln School fifth-grader Nour Azzouzi gets into the gardening.
Hundreds of daffodils and crocuses will bloom next spring in the People for Pollinators meadow thanks to the efforts of 25 Lincoln School students.
The Lincoln Land Conservation Trust (LLCT) and the METCO Coordinating Committee organized the October 19 planting of 1,000 daffodil and crocus plants at the People for Pollinators meadow close to the Smith school building. Twenty-five Lincoln School students from Lincoln and Boston participated and were joined by students from the Birches School and community members.
“The METCO Coordinating Committee is always looking for fun ways to engage our Boston-based and Lincoln-based students in exciting and enriching community-building events, and the pollinating garden event was the perfect opportunity for us,” said Pilar Doughty, METCO Coordinating Committee chair. “Our students were able to meet and collaborate with individuals from various schools and organizations across our community. As an added bonus, they learned more about pollinators and gardening techniques, and helped to make an impressive contribution to our pollinator ecosystem.”
Pilar Doughty (second from left), the Lincoln METCO Coordinating Committee chair, gets down in the dirt with students at the pollinator meadow.
People for Pollinators members prepared the meadow site for planting and helped with the bulb installation. The LLCT and Conservation Commission loaned equipment to help the effort, including shovels, trowels and rakes.
Daffodils and crocuses bloom in early spring and provide an essential early source of nectar for emerging queen bumblebees. Unlike honeybees, which can survive in a colony of many thousands over the winter, only a queen bumblebee survives and hibernates, and then re-emerges the following year to establish new colonies and the next generation of bumblebees, which help pollinate many local foods such as cranberries and apples.
The meadow got its start at a community-wide planting event last spring after several organizations and schools collaborated to form People for Pollinators, which aims to protect and create native habitat that supports the vitality of pollinators in the face of bee colony collapse.