Manitou Springs becomes first certified pollinator district in the world
MANITOU SPRINGS, Colo. (KRDO) -- Saturday, Manitou Springs became the first certified pollinator district in the world. This comes from the work of the Manitou Pollinators Partnership.
"We've seen about a 40% decline in pollinators globally, which is scary," Vice President of the Butterfly Pavilion and Commission member for Colorado's Park and Wildlife Division Dr. Rich Reading said.
"It's gonna impact the amount of food available for cows, ranchers, and pollinators," Manitou Pollinators Executive Director Melody Daugherty said. "That impacts how our food supply. Is it gonna be flush or dwindling as a result of pollinators? Which is what we're seeing."
The conservation group is trying to protect pollinators such as honey bees, butterflies, beetles, and hummingbirds by planting pollinator-friendly habitats.
"To the extent we can put that habitat back, is the extent we can reverse these trends and hopefully recover all these species," Reading said.
The Manitou Pollinators Partnership was established in 2019 through work with the Butterfly Pavilion. Which is a wildlife organization.
"Pollinators and invertebrates are disappearing at a phenomenal rate and we need to do more to protect them," Reading said. "One thing we can do is plant pollinator friendly habitats, and by producing a pollinator district, what we're doing is creating habitats throughout an area. In this case a whole community. Which is incredibly impressive that Manitou Springs has taken this on."
Manitou had to meet certain guidelines set forth by the Butterfly Pavilion to achieve this certification. By replacing exotic plants with native ones so it's pollinator friendly and reverses damaging trends.
"It has a lot to do with the planet heating up, fossil fuels, outdated farming practices due to chemical and pesticide use, and their loss of their native, biodiverse habitat," Daugherty said. "That's why our certification is so important to us because we're rebuilding their environment that they need to live, mate, breed, and raise their young."
