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Save Ohio Bees

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Massillon, OH
Save Ohio Bees

We restore pollinator habitat, fund conservation, and provide educational resources at saveohiobees.org.

Every $1K raised restores at least an acre of pollinator habitat. Get FREE bee, plant, garden, nursery, and seed guides on our website. Save Ohio Bees restores pollinator habitat, funds conservation, and provides educational resources and programming. Our vision is to empower others to restore habitat where they live, work, and play, and eliminate pesticide use in homes and gardens.

09/21/2026

What's awesome to have in the garden now? Asters! These native plants are gorgeous pollinator magnets that provide fall nectar and pollen that native bees need.

Ohio has 30 native Aster species, including the popular purple New England Aster, the pale-flowered Blue Wood Aster, the lavender Smooth Aster, and the small, white-flowered White Heath Aster.

We're gearing up to plant a host of New England Aster, since bees LOVE purple so much. And, these 'lil flowers are incredibly helpful for butterflies, including migrating Monarchs.

They also look adorable planted in pots or inside a scooped-out pumpkin.

What's happening in your garden? Post your bee-and-flower photos below!

09/09/2026

Wow! What an inspiring community event to advance Wayne County's native plant and pollinator habitat initiatives. Tracy, our founder, and Emma, our board president, were energized by friends and community connections, including senior naturalist and OSU Bug Zoo facilitator, Carrie Elvey, director of conservation and land management at the Wilderness Center, Dan Volk, board leader for the Friends of Wooster Memorial Park, Kenneth Shafer, biologist for Summit Metro Parks, Christopher Chaney, and many other passionate people.

We collaborated on ideas to restore backyard and community pollinator habitats through native plants and trees, wildflower meadow restoration, and turf transformation projects that will result in more beautiful and beneficial places while supporting healthier people, wildlife, ecosystems, and food systems, reducing pollution, and enhancing climate change resiliency.

Being surrounded by other like-minded community members, nonprofit leaders, educators, clubs, soil and water conservation leaders, and other community stewards to share ideas was exciting.

Afterward, we visited the Wooster Memorial Park wildflower meadow restoration site, one of last year's Seed Grant recipients, to see the site prep process. The two-acre site will be ready for seeding in late fall or early winter, and will feature 28 flowering wildflower species along with lush native grasses to support ground-nesting birds, pollinators, and other wildlife.

Many thanks to the Lowry Center for hosting us and to Kenneth Shafer and the Sustainable Economies team for organizing and facilitating this event.

Center // Summit Metro Parks // // The City of Wooster // College of Wooster

08/31/2026

What's that bee with the crazy long antennae? Longhorn bees (Mellisodes communis) should be easy to spot this September, as they are typically more active in the fall. The males have super long antennae that can exceed the length of their bodies. The females, on the other hand, have short antennae and bushy hind legs called a scopa to load up the pollen and take it back to the nest

Longhorn bees are solitary ground-nesting nuggets that have been found as far north as Northern Canada, and as far south as Southern Mexico.

These solitary bees build individual nests instead of colonies. The females construct the tube-like chamber in the soil and provision the nesting chamber with pollen to feed the next generation of babies. (This is a good reason to leave areas of bare soil in your flower or veggie garden that are unmulched.)

Longhorn bees have been found foraging on more than 50 wildflower genera throughout the US, including ironweed, sneezeweed, passionflower, sweet clover, and mountain mint. Longhorn bees are great for your veggie garden, and are super important pollinators of crops, like squash, mustard, sunflower, blueberry, and primrose.

FUN FACTS:
1. They like to cuddle up on flowers and sleep together. How cute is that? 🥹
2. Some species have unique greenish or bluish-gray eyes, which look like the most rad bee sunglasses. 😍

Look for these super rad bees throughout the fall, and if you're lucky enough to catch a photo, post it below and tell us what part of Ohio you're located in! 👇

08/25/2026

Thank you, Chestnut Elementary and Elm Street Elementary Bee Club! Led by Heather Bunkin, the Bee Club raised $500 to restore pollinator habitat through Save Ohio Bees! This is their second annual fundraiser for us, and we could not be more grateful for their generosity and dedication!

What happened next? This gift was allocated to our Seed Grant Fund in time for this year's awards and will restore 21,780 square feet of land into a pollinator oasis with 28 species of wildflowers! What a bunch of inspirational young people, teachers, and community members!

If you want to do the same with your family, group, or school, check out our turnkey POLLINATOR PARTY PROGRAM, complete with ideas and customizable invites.
👉 https://saveohiobees.org/pollinator-party

Together, we are making a difference in Ohio!

08/24/2026

🐝Hello, bee-ple! What bee magnets are blooming now? Herbs! This is a MINT PATCH! We saw four native bee species, two butterfly species, honey bees, and five different kinds of flies! Wild pollinators love flowering herbs.

What native plants are blooming in your garden?
Share your photos below! 👇

There's still plenty of blooming time this season to nurture pollinator and ecosystem health.

P.S. Thanks for your patience with us while we were MIA for a bit. We have been busy as bees reviewing this year's Seed Grant applicants and coordinating the awards, and we can't wait to share the details! 😍 SO EXCITING!

07/17/2026

(One more time...)Name that native bee! This tiny bee was foraging in the coreopsis. See the pollen on her legs?

Based on her wee size, coloring, and wing structure, our best guess is a sweat bee, as they can be as small as 3.36 millimeters. We also saw a tiny bi-colored sweat bee foraging with her a few seconds earlier, but couldn't catch a photo.

Sweat bees are wonderful generalist pollinators.

Some species are solitary, and each female excavates a small burrow in the soil and provides for her own offspring.
Others are communal. Several females share a common nest entrance, and each cares for its own larvae.

Some are called eusocial. These daughters help their mothers raise the next generation of sweat bees by expanding the nest and adding cells for future siblings.

One of the sweat bee's superpowers is that she can fly up to a mile in a forest, making her an important contributor to ecosystem health. (This distance equates to a human walking from Chicago to Los Angeles, which is pretty amazing!)

We love you, sweat bees.

06/22/2026

Happy Pollinator Week! Consider coneflower for your garden or flower pot. Coneflower, a.k.a. echinacea, is a gorgeous perennial pollinator magnet and medicinal plant that is native to Ohio.

CONGRATS to Jenny of Columbus, Ohio, who won our potted coneflower, garden tool, and wildflower seed giveaway at the // Franklin Park Conservatory Pollinator Palooza on Saturday!

Coneflower does well in an area that receives 6-8 hours of sun each day. They prefer medium well-drained soil, and like to be watered regularly when they are young and getting established.

Coneflower will bloom throughout the summer and through the fall until the frost comes, which is very helpful to late-season nesters like bumble bees.

You can cut the dead flowers to the next leaf stem to dead-head them, and place the spent heads on the ground for the birds and reseeding.

Avoid cutting the whole stem down, as the stems may be used by small cavity-nesting bees in the fall for overwintering.

To plant a young coneflower, dig a hole about twice the pot’s diameter. Backfill the hole to the top of the root ball. Space plants 1 to 3 feet apart. Water them in. Feed them, or place a thin layer of compost on the soil surface before adding mulch.

Coneflowers will also do well in a container/flower pot. At the end of the season, you can place the pot in the garage or basement after they go dormant, keep them watered from time to time, and bring them back out in the spring.

To get a list of Native Plants of Ohio, visit saveohiobees.org.

06/17/2026

YAY! U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service announced critical habitat designation for the Rusty Patched bumble bee! They have designated about 1.5 MILLION acres of occupied critical habitat across 33 counties in Illinois, Iowa, Minnesota, Virginia, West Virginia, and Wisconsin under the Endangered Species Act.

Of the estimated 16-20 bumble bee species in Ohio, about half are already considered to be rare or uncommon.

The Rusty Patched bumble bee has only been sighted in Ohio twice in the last 20 years, and the Yellow-banded bumble bee has not been sighted here since 1981 (Goodell, et al., 2019).

Bumble bees are essential pollinators in North America, particularly of vegetable crops and ecosystems.

Ohio is one of the top 10 growers of pumpkins, tomatoes, bell peppers, grapes, apples, and strawberries, among others (Ohio Secretary of State, 2022), and 1 in 7 people in Ohio are employed by agriculture, making the health of bumble bees and other native bees essential to the families and economy of our region.

Pollinator habitat restoration is essential to the recovery of bumble bees and other native bees. Ohio is home to nearly 500 species of native bees!

Would you donate to restore pollinator habitat? Every $1,000 we raise restores at least 43,560 sq. ft. of pollinator habitat in Ohio. www.saveohiobees.org/donate

06/09/2026

Who's busy in June? Squash bees! Squash bees (Peponapis pruinosa) are essential pollinators that depend exclusively on cucurbit plants (pumpkins, squash, and gourds) for pollen and nectar.

Females dig solitary vertical tunnels for nesting, directly under the foliage of squash plants. These nesting chambers can be up to two feet deep. Basically, they nest where they eat.

Squash bees forage during the early morning when the blossoms open, and can often be found sleeping in the withered blossoms in the afternoon, like this 'lil dude.

Squash bees are three times more effective at pollinating zucchini and pumpkins than honey bees, and are able to visit far more flowers per minute.

Did you know that Ohio ranks among the top U.S. producers of pumpkins, with more than 7,000 acres dedicated to this beloved crop? Pumpkins in Ohio generate between $15 and $20 million each year, making squash bees essential to our farmers and state economy.

THANK YOU, SQUASH BEES!

How can we help squash bees?

First, no tilling. Because squash bee pupae overwinter in nests beneath the ground, deep tillage will destroy them. Gardeners and farmers should avoid deep tillage in vegetable patches or leave part of the field untilled for these babies.

Second, no pesticides. These soil-dwelling darlings are highly vulnerable to chemicals applied to the ground or plant bases.

05/26/2026

Have you ever noticed perfectly carved circles or ovals missing from your garden plants? It's nearly leafcutter bee season!

In Ohio, magical leafcutter bees are usually active between June and August. These solitary bees emerge when daytime temperatures consistently reach 70-75 degrees.

Adult bees spend 4–6 weeks actively foraging, mating, and laying eggs in hollow stems, wood cavities, or tunnels. Or, commercially made bee houses with larger tube structures. (We love the leafcutter bee homes made in Ohio by Osmia Bee.)

These bees use smooth-leaved plants to build their gorgeous nesting tubes, and you may see them cutting circular pieces out of plants like rose bushes, hostas, red bud trees, or lilacs. But don't worry. This does NOT harm the plants.

Many late-season fruits and vegetables depend on leafcutter bees for pollination. Some leafcutting bees are even used as commercial pollinators (like honey bees) in crops such as alfalfa, carrots, and blueberries.

Leafcutter bees are solitary bees. They do not form colonies or have queens like honey bees. The female leafcutter bees do the work, locating nesting sites, creating nest cells from leaf and petal fragments, and providing the eggs with food. Adult females may live up to two months and lay between 30 and 40 eggs.

This is one of the reasons that leaving the hollow stems in the garden is so important, along with lots of native flowers to provide pollen and nectar.

Do your homework on commercial nesting boxes if you're interested in hosting these bees. There are important things to know about these solitary cavity-nesters to set them up for success.

Address

Massillon, OH
44646

Opening Hours

Monday	9am - 5pm
Tuesday	9am - 5pm
Wednesday	9am - 5pm
Thursday	9am - 5pm
Friday	9am - 5pm
Saturday	9am - 12pm

Website

http://www.saveohiobees.org/

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