Seedling Progress

Our seedlings are looking great, and we have begun the hardening off process. Today I put the seedlings outside for a couple of hours, and then increase the amount of time they are outside for 7 days. Avoid putting your seedlings in the direct sun in the beginning and make sure you water them well during this process.

Bees on a Plane

This is a first for me. I am traveling to Washington DC with 3,000 + pinned bees from one of our research studies. The project examined the value of urban agricultural crops and weedy plants as forage for pollinators. I will meet with an expert tomorrow who will verify our identifications before we move forward to publish the study.

Sprouts

I was excited to see that some of my peppers have sprouted when I got into my office this morning. Once they establish 1-2 true leaves i will begin to harden them off.

Meet Andrew!

All of you have communicated with Andrew Mularo the undergraduate student who has worked so hard to launch this study! Here he is packing tool kits for shipping last week. Andrew is a student in OSU’s department of Evolution, Ecology and Organismal Biology. Not only does he work on this project but also volunteers in other labs on campus! Andrew aims to go to graduate school to further his ecology studies upon graduation from OSU.

96 Volunteers and Counting!

We are thrilled to have 96 volunteers registered as of today! This means we are half way to our goal. Thank you all so much for helping us get the word out. We appreciate all the emails and Facebook shares that have spread the word about this study.

Looking to Sign Up for PI?

Thank you so much for your interest in Pollination Investigators. If you are coming to the site looking for instructions on how to sign up check out the “sign up” page, which will let you know all the information needed and how to enroll by contacting Andrew Mularo an undergraduate at OSU assisting with this study. Please, review the experimental protocol found on the “experiment” page before committing, this study does require several steps to complete. Thank you very much! Mary.

56 Volunteers So Far!

After three days of advertising we have registered 56 people to collect data for Pollination Investigators. I am so excited by the response and very thankful that so many of you are willing to help us study bee activity this summer. We are still looking for 144 more volunteers to get to our goal of 200, so if you have an email group or website that you manage and can help get the word out let me know, I can send you a summary to distribute. If you have not yet requested a toolkit, please review our “experiment” page of this site to see what you would be doing as part of the team. If you would like to enroll you will find out how to do so on the “sign up!” page of this site. Thank you all so much! Mary.

Facebook

Are you on Facebook? You can follow the PI program at our page: https://www.facebook.com/pollinationinvestigators/. We are going to post some live videos this spring demonstrating how to set up your test plants including the exclusion cage, conduct hand pollination, and harvest on our page! This is also a great way to ask questions, as many volunteers are likely wondering the same thing. Thanks to all who have signed up, we are so excited! Mary.

Help Get the Word Out!

Are you a Master Gardener or Naturalist? Involved in Nature or Wildlife Related Organization? 4H leader? If you think members of your group would be interested in participating in Pollination Investigators please help us to get the word out about this citizen science program.  We aim to mail out our toolkits over the next two weeks, and are seeking 200 volunteers from across the state!