Say no to spring cleaning!
The emergence of warm weather likely gets you in the mood to clean up your yard for a new growing season. But that cleanup, if done too early, can doom a great percentage of bees, butterflies, and other insects such as fireflies that overwinter in leaf litter and hollow plant stems. Many butterflies overwinter in pupae form that is camouflaged to look exactly like a dried leaf. Other insects lay their eggs on fallen leaves, and early leaf cleanup will prevent the eggs from hatching. Ground nesting bees may have started to fly around during the day, but still need leaf cover at night for survival.
A Cellophane ground nesting mining bee (Colletes bee) emerges from its nest in early spring
Here are several sources of info on choosing when to do cleanup (if at all) in order to provide habitat for pollinators:
Cleanup timing: https://xerces.org/blog/dont-spring-into-garden-cleanup-too-soon
How and when bees lay their eggs in hollow stems (this graphic is a great visual on the life cycle of stem-nesting bees) https://xerces.org/sites/default/files/publications/22-005_01_web-screen.pdf
Leave the leaves: https://xerces.org/leave-the-leaves
Should you participate in “No Mow May”? or maybe “No Mow April”?
https://beecityusa.org/no-mow-may/
https://beecityusa.org/no-mow-may-low-mow-spring-faqs/
https://apnews.com/article/gardening-no-mow-may-lawns-6aa1669b9e9bb5b5d8ea671c44d186f2
A little info about ground bees: https://thebeeconservancy.org/ground-nesting-bees/
Many people confuse gentle ground nesting bees with yellow jackets; here’s some help identifying which is which: