Four new pollinator pathway gardens have been installed during a public planting day in the Rangiora central business district.

The new gardens are in Blake Street and last Sunday morning a small group of volunteers turned out to help members of the Waimakariri District

Council’s biodiversity team dig in the new native plants, which included New Zealand daphne (pimelea prostrata), forget-me-not (myotis colensoi), coprosma brunnea, muehlenbeckia axillaris, New Zealand iris (libertia grandiflora), leptinella dioica, dichondra repens and lobelia angulata.

The idea behind the new gardens is to create something beautiful for the community by planting corridors of pesticide-free plants that will attract more pollinators, including beetles, moths, bees, butterflies, birds and lizards, to the urban environment while also providing an opportunity for homeowners to learn how to create pollination pathways in their own gardens.

The Blake Street gardens are the first pollinator pathways to be created in Rangiora but the plan is to eventually add more, the Waimakariri District

Council biodiversity team’s field ranger, Kimberley Gorton, of South New Brighton, says.

Pollinator pathway projects have become popular overseas. The initiative began in 2007 when Sarah Bergmann, an artist living in Seattle, in the United States, envisioned creating a network of native gardens, which would connect neighbourhoods and create food pathways for pollinators, that even the most novice gardeners could contribute to. Sarah’s idea led to the creation of the informative Pollinator Pathway website which can be accessed online at: https://www.pollinator-pathway.org.