UC San Diego "Pollinator Garden"

The "pollinator garden" just North of the Main Gym between Revelle and Muir is rather lacking, to say the least. It's about 150 square feet of random, incoherent landscaping with the intention of promoting pollinators. While its intention may be good, its execution is definitely not. The choices of plants are hilariously misguided.

Here are some images of the garden:

And some highlights of particularly strange plant choices:

Invasive Echium candicans, which only supports similarly invasive honey bees.

A random cycad (Cycas revoluta?)? When I think of plants that support pollinators, cycads are definitely not the first that come to mind.

Why is there a Plumeria sp.?

Another strange choice is the orchid visible in the bottom-center of the second image, though I didn't get a picture of that in particular.

Some problems with this

While many of these plants are not particularly harmful (e.g. the cycad, Plumeria, etc.), many are. The invasive Echium candicans is one specific plant that comes to mind, but there are other examples. I counted two tropical milkweeds (Asclepias curassavica), which are likely more harmful for the endangered western monarch butterflies than having no milkweed at all (ideally, as a "pollinator garden," there would be plenty of the native Asclepias fascicularis and others). Additionally, the butterfly bush Buddleja davidii is potentially invasive in California and, though its common name might suggest otherwise, is not particularly beneficial to native butterflies. Like the tropical milkweed, if the goal is to support native butterflies, it should be replaced with a native species.
Ironically, the only native species I could find is the Erigeron canadensis, which probably wasn't even planted there intentionally. I'm not even entirely sure it is Erigeron canadensis.

Posted on 26 de outubro de 2022, 04:40 PM by bri-k