July 2026 Update

How is the Pollinator Pathway initiative doing, one year later? Please see the article at the bottom of this update and share as widely as possible.

Happy Independence Month! Our nation’s founders were deeply into native plants, which were a matter of pride for them. As told by Andrea Wulf in the book Founding Gardeners, the British were sneering at us, maintaining that our flora and fauna were puny compared to European ones. It’s safe to say that we won that argument.

Upcoming events  

• July 18, 2026. 11:00 a.m. - 2:00 p.m. Pollinator Palooza at Mason Neck State Park. Enjoy hands-on activities and take a tour of our pollinator gardens and learn how planting a few simple plants in your yard can support wildlife. Meet us near the picnic area for this event and learn how you can become a champion for these hardworking wildlife species. This event is free to attend, after you pay the $10 parking fee. 

• July 22, 7:00 pm How to Talk to Your Neighbors (and Your HOA) About Your Garden. Online. Details here.

• July 23, 7:00 pm  Native Bees and Native Plants: Partners in Pollination. On Zoom. Details here.

• October 2026 - Tree Rescue Extravaganza II - Multiple volunteer tree rescue events will take place across Fairfax/Falls Church during the four weekends of October. Start planning yours now!  Watch the Fairfax Tree Rescuers PRISM website for details.

Correction: We stated last month that flycatchers are cavity nesters. Great Crested Flycatchers sometimes use cavities, but most flycatchers don’t. Our apologies.

Report your native tree and shrub plantings

Please help Northern Virginia meet its canopy goals by reporting your native tree and shrub plantings here. So far 22,055 have been reported! Every native tree and shrub provides habitat, cooling, and stormwater capture.

Report your tree rescues

Millions of trees in Northern Virginia are at risk from invasive non-native vines. You can help by saving them on your own land or by volunteering on public land. So far, 25,536 tree rescues have been reported in Northern Virginia. Please add your report here if you live anywhere other than within the Fairfax County/Falls Church boundaries. In Fairfax/Falls Church, please report here instead.

Next Steering Committee meeting – July 23, 10am-noon via videoconferencing. All are welcome. Check our Event Calendar for future meetings.

This month’s newsletter articles to share. For social media, please use this link.

Pollinator Pathways Turn One in Northern Virginia

By Eileen Ellsworth

One year ago, Plant NOVA Natives launched a Pollinator Pathway initiative. The original program was created by a group of highly credentialed environmentalists and conservationists in Wilton, Connecticut and expanded by PNN into Northern Virginia. Its goal is to address habitat fragmentation caused by human activity that has drastically reduced insect populations and degraded the environment. The program suggests ways a community, working together, could create “stepping stones” of native plants to connect these isolated fragments and build a feeding/sheltering/hosting corridor that insects can find and follow.

As a result of the Pollinator Pathway launch, several neighborhoods across the region have taken steps to build one. Many more native plants have ended up in the ground, all of them strategically placed to help local pollinators find sources of food and shelter they so desperately need. Here are some highlights from the past year that may motivate action going forward.    

You may recall that the program has two requirements for membership. First, you need to have a native plant pollinator garden or a native tree on your property. Second, you must avoid the use of all broadcast pesticides, including mosquito fogging, which kills every native insect it touches – except the mosquitos’ own larvae! Those happily grow and hatch away in standing water, unfazed by the chemical. 

With these requirements in mind, several people in Fairfax and Arlington set out to start pathways, using the Pollinator Pathway signs to help attract interest. There have been many reports of curious neighbors and passers-by who stopped to inquire about the initiative. While the signs certainly helped educate, the program also fostered a deeper sense of community and a growing energy around the program’s goal.   

For example, Margaret Fisher created a Pollinator Pathway in Clifton. “It couldn’t have been easier. I had already gone door-to-door ten years ago or so to sign neighbors up for a ‘Bee Safe Neighborhood,’ where people pledged not to use neonicotinoid insecticides outdoors. We celebrated our neighborhood with a very fun block party. I have email addresses for some of those folks and was able to easily convince them to sign up for the Pollinator Pathway. The properties lead more or less contiguously to Chapel Road Park. Very few people in our area use mosquito spraying services, and I hope seeing the signs along the road may prompt those that do to cancel those services.”

Melania Flores took advantage of an existing effort to plant more canopy trees in her Ashton Heights neighborhood. She reached out to that group, which gave her access to a wider neighborhood audience. She knocked on doors, created and printed flyers, and presented the topic at one of the monthly Ashton Heights Civic Association (AHCA) meetings. She also started writing a monthly article for her neighborhood newsletter to further engage and educate. All told, her efforts have garnered 24 Pollinator Pathway participants to date, and that number is growing. All of them have signs that broadcast the program. Melania has been invited to neighbors’ homes and the local church to consult on how they can help. She even offered some of her own native plants as a benefit of joining. And lastly, the entire neighboring community organized a “buckets of doom” initiative with mosquito dunks to help control mosquitos in an effective, environmentally friendly manner.   

Sara Holtz recruited 95 properties to the effort, including parks in the Town of Vienna and Fairfax City. She tapped several friends and neighbors in the Miller Heights neighborhood of Oakton and conducted tabling efforts at events hosted by the Vienna Farmer’s Market, the Virginia Department of Forestry, and the Greater Oakton Community Association. She contacted Supervisor Dalia Palchik, Delegate Holly Seibold, and School Board member Melanie Meren to put signs in their gardens. Some local elected officials also promoted the endeavor in their newsletters at her request. The owner of The Virginian Restaurant agreed to put a sign in his garden next to the restaurant. She posted on the Native Vienna Facebook group reaching all homeowners who follow it. Many hundreds of local property owners were engaged and educated through her efforts.

Constance Chubb and Melinda Soltys both rallied their neighbors and friends, grew the program’s membership, and gave away many plants and signs. As for me, I also created a street-based initiative, recruiting eight friends and neighbors to join and display signs. In addition to planting more natives on our own properties, we coordinated on non-native invasive removal efforts in the community-owned park – a collection of wooded parcels that weave between our homes and throughout the neighborhood. Finally, we built a new, very visible pollinator garden on a street-side plot of mowed Japanese stilt grass. Figured we couldn’t go wrong with that one.  Our pathway connects via Difficult Run Stream Valley Park to Sara Holtz’ Oakton pathway. That is a lot of land where pollinators are protected from insecticides!

Turns out the effort can be as small or as large as you personally choose to make it. The goal is not a perfect carpet of native plants that stretches down the entire length of the street (though that would be amazing). Rather, it’s closing the gap between existing native plantings, which is certainly doable. Even the smallest effort of planting one new native helps. Arranging several new natives in a grouping is a substantial benefit. Either way, the Pollinator Pathway program has inspired important conversations and goal-oriented action, delivering on its promise to better feed and shelter our struggling pollinators and improve the biodiversity of the entire region.

Want to get involved? Visit the Pollinator Pathway page on the PNN website, check out the “Tips for Organizers,” and get started today.