The Great Sunflower Project
Bees: Responsible for Every Third Bite of Food
Welcome to the Hunt for Bees!
We are so glad that you are joining us! Please collect data once or twice a month during this summer. We’d love to have a sample from the early part of each month and the later part of each month for as many months as your have flowers. This year we are hoping to get counts from as many gardens as possible. If you are able to collect information at more than one place, we’d love to have it! If you are interested in leading a group of gardeners, do join our garden leader program. You can find information at our website.
How to sample:
What you need: Sunflowers, a place to sit comfortably, a data sheet (on the accompanying sheet), a pen or pencil, and a watch. You might also bring a camera.
Pick a warm sunny day and if possible, sample in the morning. We recommend 9 or10 am.
Here are the four steps:
1) Set yourself up near your plant. Focus in on one plant, count and record the number of open flowers on your plant. Don’t count older flowers that might not have pollen or nectar. You can tell if a flower is old by touching the center part and seeing if your finger picks up pollen.
2) Write down your starting time (e.g. 10:00 am).
3) For each bee that visits the plant, write down it’s arrival time (e.g. 10:02 am) and note what kind of bee it is (see bee guide).
5) Stop after 15 minutes have passed
6) Enter the data at: www.greatsunflower.org. After you login, look at the top bar and find “Report your bee count”
If you can, we would love to have photos of the bees. You can upload your photos on Flickr and link them to our Great Sunflower Group. Remember, seeing no bees is even more important to report than seeing bees.
Thanks so much,
Gretchen LeBuhn
The Great Sunflower
San Francisco State University
1600 Holloway Avenue
San Francisco, CA 94132
Fax 415-405-0306
Bees: Responsible for Every Third Bite of Food
Welcome to the Hunt for Bees!
We are so glad that you are joining us! Please collect data once or twice a month during this summer. We’d love to have a sample from the early part of each month and the later part of each month for as many months as your have flowers. This year we are hoping to get counts from as many gardens as possible. If you are able to collect information at more than one place, we’d love to have it! If you are interested in leading a group of gardeners, do join our garden leader program. You can find information at our website.
How to sample:
What you need: Sunflowers, a place to sit comfortably, a data sheet (on the accompanying sheet), a pen or pencil, and a watch. You might also bring a camera.
Pick a warm sunny day and if possible, sample in the morning. We recommend 9 or10 am.
Here are the four steps:
1) Set yourself up near your plant. Focus in on one plant, count and record the number of open flowers on your plant. Don’t count older flowers that might not have pollen or nectar. You can tell if a flower is old by touching the center part and seeing if your finger picks up pollen.
2) Write down your starting time (e.g. 10:00 am).
3) For each bee that visits the plant, write down it’s arrival time (e.g. 10:02 am) and note what kind of bee it is (see bee guide).
5) Stop after 15 minutes have passed
6) Enter the data at: www.greatsunflower.org. After you login, look at the top bar and find “Report your bee count”
If you can, we would love to have photos of the bees. You can upload your photos on Flickr and link them to our Great Sunflower Group. Remember, seeing no bees is even more important to report than seeing bees.
Thanks so much,
Gretchen LeBuhn
The Great Sunflower
San Francisco State University
1600 Holloway Avenue
San Francisco, CA 94132
Fax 415-405-0306