Did you notice something about the species mentioned above? They are all specialists on particular plants. This means we need specific plants to gather pollen to provide for our young. This is where you, dear gardener, come in to help us! Have a look at the plants our species need for life (check the right-most column of this table). You’ll see early spring-flowering woody plants like willows, blueberries, dogwoods, and raspberries, and spring bulbs like bellworts, cress, toothwort, trout lilies, spring beauty, and geraniums. For the summer and fall species, you’ll see asters, goldenrods, sunflowers, and rudbeckias. The key plants are early-flowering spring plants (think native bulbs and woody flowering shrubs and trees), followed by summer- and fall-blooming herbaceous flowers. Please steer clear of near natives as they might produce less pollen than wild plants. Non-natives are a non-starter for us. Take daylilies, for example. They are striking, but the timing of flowering, along with the flower size and pollen are of no use to the trout lily specialist Andrena erythronii.