Floral Provisioning for Wild Bee Pollinators in Winter Squash and Muskmelon

When we talk about pollination, the image that comes to mind most frequently is the honeybee. Honeybees do provide the majority of pollination services in our current agricultural system. However, there are wild bees pollinating flowering crops at the same time and these bees are capable of providing a significant portion of the pollination services required of many crops. In fact, in some instances, wild bees may be better pollinators than managed honeybees.