It all started with the Lego Robotics Competition which focused on using technology to assist nature. Itasca Countys 4-H Cobra Programming Robotics Team earned second place in their division at Regionals and took first place in robot design and programming. At Sectionals, the team took first place in the Head-to-Head and first place for innovative robot design.

For the project portion of the competition, the robotics team chose to help bees. Through their research, they discovered that native bees and other pollinators are at serious peril because of a lack of native plants to provide nutrition, habitat and pesticide-free places to rear their young. They learned from the University of Minnesota Bee Lab that habitat loss has had a devastating effect on native pollinators that rely on wild and semi-wild areas for forage. In Minnesotas increasingly altered landscape, we are seeing troubling declines in the diversity of both native flowering plants and our native pollinators. The Robotics team was surprised to learn that more than one-third of their food supply requires pollination and that the 400 species of Minnesota native bees as well as honey bees are vital to pollination of such crops as apple, cherry, blueberry, squash and many others.

One of the ways they chose to help the bees was by planting a native pollinator garden. Thanks to the support of the Grand Rapids Library and help from the Grand Rapids Public Works Department, the team was able to plant the garden on library grounds near the river walk. More than a dozen native, pesticide-free plants were donated from the pollinator gardens of Library Volunteer Coordinator, Bonnie Henriksen, and Itasca County Extension Master Gardeners Coby Bunna, Sue Roy and Bonny Siegford. Siegford created a garden plan and assisted the team with planting and mulching their flowering plants. The 4-Hers in the Itasca County Science and Robotics program will water, maintain, and care for the garden. The team members are looking forward to seeing their garden in bloom with a variety of pollinators harvesting nectar and pollen from native plants.

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Why did the Itasca County 4-H Robotics Team plant a pollinator garden at the library? - Herald Review