June 27, 202312:00 pm ET

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Did you know that one in every three bites of food we eat comes from pollinated crops? Pollinators, such as bees, butterflies, moths, birds and bats, help most flowers bloom and crops reproduce. They are essential to biodiversity, our natural ecosystem and the economy.

Sadly, many pollinator species are in decline due to invasive plants and insects, habitat loss, disease, pesticides and other factors. Many pollinators face an uncertain future!

In this free webinar, you’ll learn how we are creating, protecting and studying habitats that provide food and shelter for these important animals and insects.

  • Discover how we are transforming several of our community flower gardens to pollinator gardens and planting trees along streams that provide food and shelter for pollinators.
  • Learn how we have transformed agricultural land into thriving meadows supporting bees, butterflies and birds.
  • Hear about a 10-state study, “Bees of the Barrens,” that identified relationships between the management of rare barrens habitats and the bee communities they support.
  • Get tips for creating pollinator friendly habitat, from containers or small garden plots to meadowland., from containers or small garden plots to meadowland.
  • Learn how you can get involved by helping us plant and care for flowers and trees that support pollinators.

Join Lori Kofalt, our community greening horticultural coordinator, and Betsy Leppo, invertebrate zoologist with WPC’s Pennsylvania Natural Heritage program staff, for a fascinating discussion about the diversity and importance of Pennsylvania’s pollinating insects and their habitats, from urban gardens to wild lands, and how you can help support them!

About the Presenters

Betsy Leppo, Invertebrate Zoologist

Betsy grew up with parents who taught high school science, in a home next to Gifford Pinchot State Park in York County, and was thus destined to become a biologist. Betsy started working with the Pennsylvania Natural Heritage Program as an intern in 1992, then as an assistant data manager with The Nature Conservancy in 1996, and finally as an invertebrate zoologist with the Western Pennsylvania Conservancy since 2006. Betsy conducts surveys for terrestrial and aquatic insects and other invertebrates, maintains specimen collections and databases, and develops conservation recommendations for at-risk species and their habitats.

Lori Kofalt, Community Greening Horticultural Coordinator

Lori Kofalt is a PLNA Certified Horticulturist and the horticultural coordinator in the community greening department at the Western Pennsylvania Conservancy.

Before joining WPC in 2018, Lori earned her diploma in Horticulture Technology from Bidwell Training Center and completed internships at Allegheny Land Trust and the Native Plant Nursery at the Audubon Society at Beechwood Farms Nature Reserve. Lori has designed numerous pollinator gardens and is passionate about designing with native plants to support Pennsylvania’s native pollinators.

In her free time Lori is learning to roller-skate, and likes to paint, garden and hike with her husband, Jack, and their two dogs, Rocky and Dozer.

June 27, 202312:00 pm

Watch Recording