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Celebrating Women’s Work with Plants: Sarah Red-Laird By Rhonda Nowak Jun 05, 2022 12:15 AM A A 4 View all photos The Bee Girl Organization creates buzz at home and abroad Sarah Red-Laird is executive director of the Ashland-based Bee Girl Organization, which manages bee habitat projects and researches bee populations. Courtesy photo Beekeepers hear from Sarah Red-Laird, executive director of the Ashland-based Bee Girl Organization, who started advocating for bees after she learned about colony collapse disorder. Courtesy photo Beekeepers hear from Sarah Red-Laird, right, executive director of the Ashland-based Bee Girl Organization, who started advocating for bees after she learned about colony collapse disorder. Courtesy photo Sarah Red-Laird is executive director of the Ashland-based Bee Girl Organization, which manages bee habitat projects and researches bee populations. Editor’s note: This is the final story in a series about women gardeners in the Rogue Valley. “Perhaps the silver lining of Colony Collapse Disorder is its wake-up call to invest time, research and energy into new managed pollinators and new ways of looking at farm management for the betterment of all pollinators. We are being asked to picture a future in agriculture where even the most intensively managed almond orchards, cranberry bogs and squash fields make room for flowering plants that complement blooming crops and have strategically placed hives of honey bees, tubes of leafcutters, boxes of bumblebees and natural habitat that provides a home for wild native bees.” – Mace Vaughan in “Managing Alternative Pollinators,” 2010 One day about 15 years ago, Sarah Red-Laird was enjoying some Haagen-Dazs vanilla honey bee ice cream when she read about colony collapse disorder on the side of the container. CCD is an abnormal phenomenon that occurs when the majority of worker bees in a honey bee colony suddenly disappear, leaving behind the queen and a few young bees. The syndrome was named colony collapse disorder in 2007 when thousands of managed western honey bee (Apis mellifera) colonies disappeared throughout North America. “That phenomenon tugged pretty hard on my heartstrings, as I’ve always been a honey lover and a bee lover,” Sarah said. “That’s when I decided to take up the protection of bees as a cause.” Sarah began researching bees in 2009 as a student at the University of Montana. Through her studies, she learned there is no silver bullet to saving the bees. Banning one class of pesticides or developing a medicinal treatment is not the answer. “The answer is bringing complexity and diversity back to agriculture by transitioning away from chemical-focused farming and ranching and toward natural, regenerative systems,” Sarah said. “Plant diversity is one of the key components of this work. The majority of bees are not specialists and need a diverse diet of nectar and pollen to stay healthy. So does the soil, and so do we.” Today, as founder and executive director of the Bee Girl Organization based in Ashland, Sarah’s mission is to “see to it that every available space is covered with chemical-free flowers for bees.” She manages three bee habitat projects at a cattle ranch, a vineyard and a vernal pond restoration site. She also is the director of the American Beekeeper Association’s youth program, which focuses on getting kids excited about planting flowers and understanding the connection between people, wildlife and the environment. The Bee Girl Organization’s principal project is Regenerative Bee Pastures, aimed at helping pasture managers provide more habitat for bees by utilizing regenerative, rotational grazing and holistic management. According to the U.S. Department of Agriculture, range and pasture lands use more than 27% (528 million acres) of the total acreage of the contiguous United States, more than forestland (21%) or crop land (18%). “I would really like to see 15 or 16 different species of flowers blooming in these pastures,” Sarah said, noting prairie lands that supported American bison used to include more than 100 different species of flora. Through her research, Sarah has found three particularly useful plant species for supporting bees in pastures. The first is lacy phacelia (P. tanacetifolia), an annual herb with purple flowers that attract generalist and native bees. The second is Maximillian sunflowers (Helianthus maximiliani), a drought-tolerant and fire-resistant perennial that is highly nutritious for bees and livestock. The third is a perennial legume called sainfoin (Onobrychis viciifolia), a European native grown as a foraging crop for centuries. The pink flowers are prolific producers of nectar and pollen, and the plant acts as a natural dewormer for livestock. “We’ve been intensively working on this project for the past three years,” Sarah told me. An ongoing challenge is finding effective pollinator plants for pastures that are resilient to climate change and drought conditions, she said. The Bee Girl Organization’s second habitat project is located at the Oregon Department of Transportation’s Vernal Pool Restoration site near the Table Rocks Whetstone Savannah in Central Point. ODOT manages almost 200 acres there as a conservation “bank.” Whenever ODOT takes over any sensitive land area by creating or expanding roads, they use the funds to restore vernal ponds at the site. Vernal ponds, or pools, are seasonal wetlands that provide habitat for unique plant and animal species. Bees are an indicator species of the overall health of the vernal pond habitat. Sarah monitors the presence of bees and their relationship with plants at the site and reports her data to ODOT every month, which helps in making planting decisions for the following year. For example, Sarah found that pennyroyal and teasel, both nonnative plants that are considered invasive, actually help to sustain native bee populations during times of the year when other plants aren’t blooming. Her research showed that teasel is important to bumblebees, and pennyroyal feeds Andrena, a genus of small, ground-nesting bees. Since Sarah has been working at the vernal pool site, she’s watched a highly degraded piece of land become healthy again. “It’s been amazing to see how resilient a landscape can be,” she said. Sarah started the Bee-Friendly Vineyard initiative eight years ago when she realized that “massive pollinator deserts” are being formed throughout Oregon as more land is used for viticulture. Grapevines are self-pollinating, so many vineyards do not have plants that support bees. Sarah said although many vineyards claim to be “bee-friendly” by hosting honey bee hives, the Bee Girl program advocates for chemical-free habitats that support managed and wild bees without keeping hives on site. For the past two years, she has partnered with Trisaetum, a vineyard and winery in the Willamette Valley, to develop management practices that could be replicated in other vineyards. “Our philosophy is to spray less and plant more,” Sarah told me. They’ve covered many open spaces in the vineyard with wildflowers, but the most beneficial practice has been to stop mowing between the vines. “Wildflowers that used to be mowed down every year came back with wild abandon, and there were tons of bees all over them,” she said. Deep-rooted wildflowers are not only drought-resistant pollinator plants; they also help to prevent soil erosion and stabilize grapevine plantings on hillsides. Not all of Sarah’s Bee Girl Organization work is conducted domestically. She recently traveled to Tanzania, where she consulted on a project called Wild Survivors, which aims to prevent conflicts that occur when elephants destroy crops growing alongside an important elephant corridor. As it turns out, elephants are terrified of bees; even the sound of buzzing bees will keep them away. Through the Wild Survivors program, farmers are learning beekeeping skills that allow them to replace human guards with beehive “fences.” An added bonus is that farmers are able to sell the honey for additional income. Land management practices that provide bee habitat also help with crop pollination and soil improvement. Although colony collapse disorder is less common among honeybee populations now, beekeepers continue to struggle to keep their honeybees alive, having to rely on more medication and supplemental feed to keep them healthy. Meanwhile, more pesticides are used on commercial crops, and fewer flowers are planted that would sustain native and nonnative bees. “Bees are incredibly resilient,” Sarah pointed out. “If they’re having a hard time, they’re showing us that something needs to change in the way we grow our food. Sometimes I feel overwhelmed by the money and power behind Big Ag that allows our toxin-laden industrial agricultural system to continue.” However, Sarah said she’s heartened by seeing a shift toward more regenerative farms where food crops are grown with an eye toward improving the landscape and the soil. She said she’s also seen a huge increase in public awareness about the plight of bees and other pollinators. “The depth of knowledge and concern has grown exponentially, and that has been really inspiring,” she said. It’s been a long, sometimes difficult, but gratifying journey since the day Sarah learned about colony collapse disorder on an ice cream container (Haagen-Dazs discontinued the vanilla honey bee flavor several years ago). While she recognizes all the work still to do, Sarah remains passionate and optimistic about her mission to protect bees. “I love bees, and I love to tell people why I love bees,” she told me. “The message gets out there and touches people, and then they’re able to begin a relationship with bees. That translates into conservation practices and making different choices in the voting booth, or about the food they eat or what they’re spraying in their garden.” For more about the Bee Girl Organization, see beegirl.org. Sarah’s favorite landscape “I love a pasture full of flowers and grazing livestock. Regenerative bee pastures benefit people (healthy food, clean water, climate benefits), the environment (improved soil health and water cycling) and animals (livestock animals, such as honey bees and cattle, and wild animals, such as bumble bees, songbirds, bobcats and deer).” Inspiring women Jane Goodall is an English primatologist and anthropologist who founded the Roots and Shoots community action program in 1991. Marla Spivak is an American entomologist and professor at the University of Minnesota. Wangari Maathai was a Kenyan social, environmental and political activist and the first African woman to win the Nobel Peace Prize. Inspiring literature “The Poisonwood Bible,” a novel by Barbara Kingsolver, published in 1998. “Braiding Sweetgrass: Indigenous Wisdom, Scientific Knowledge and the Teachings of Plants,” a nonfiction book by botany professor Robin Wall Kimmerer, published in 2013. “The Botany of Desire: A Plant’s-Eye View of the World,” a nonfiction book by Michael Pollan, published in 2001. “A Sand County Almanac,” a nonfiction book by Aldo Leopold, published in 1949. Rhonda Nowak is a Rogue Valley gardener, teacher and writer. Email her at [email protected]