Pollination

The Beet: A Podcast For Plant Lovers

Epic Gardening

Home & Garden, Education, Leisure, How To

4.8 • 1.6K Ratings

🗓️ 22 June 2023

⏱️ 14 minutes

🔗️ Recording | iTunes | RSS

🧾️ Download transcript

Summary

Believe it or not, bats are pollinators who transfer pollen from plant to plant, feeding on flower nectar. You can include certain plants in your garden to attract them. Connect With Merlin Tuttle: Dr. Merlin Tuttle is widely recognized as the father of modern bat conservation; he is an ecologist, wildlife photographer, and conservationist who has studied bats and championed their preservation for over 60 years; widely recognized as the father of modern bat conservation. He's the founder of Merlin Tuttle’s Bat Conservation, home to his legacy and devoted to research, education, and the conservation of bats, where he is currently and solely active. Through MTBC he provides the world's finest bat photo gallery, the most up-to-date responses to exaggerated disease speculation, and it is the only place to access his more than 60 years of unique experience or support his continuing efforts. Joined by Teresa Nichta ("nikta"), Outreach and Collection Manager at Merlin Tuttle’s Bat Conservation. Teresa manages Merlin’s extensive photographic collection as well as social media, video production, field planning, development, correspondence, and all things in between. Website Twitter Instagram Facebook YouTube Buy Birdies Garden Beds Use code EPICPODCAST for 5% off your first order of Birdies metal raised garden beds, the best metal raised beds in the world. They last 5-10x longer than wooden beds, come in multiple heights and dimensions, and look absolutely amazing. Click here to shop Birdies Garden Beds Buy My Book My book, Field Guide to Urban Gardening, is a beginners guide to growing food in small spaces, covering 6 different methods and offering rock-solid fundamental gardening knowledge: Order on Amazon Order a signed copy Follow Epic Gardening YouTube Instagram Pinterest Facebook Facebook Group Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

Transcript

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0:00.0	Welcome back my friends to Bat Week here on the Epic Gardening podcast.
0:15.8	We are back with Dr. Merlin Tuttle, the father of modern bat conservation and the founder
0:19.8	of Merlin Tuttle's bat conservation, as well as Theresa Nicta, the outreach and collection
0:24.3	manager at MTPC.
0:26.8	So we talked a little bit about their role in pollination Merlin in a couple of episodes
0:33.5	ago, but let's go to maybe the home garden first.
0:37.8	If I'm growing a backyard garden full of maybe annual vegetables, maybe some annual fruits
0:43.1	like maybe a strawberry, and then maybe I've got a couple fruit trees, how much of an impact
0:49.9	of bats play to pollination and just someone's backyard garden.
0:54.3	Unfortunately, not much if you live in the United States because most pollinating bats
1:00.7	live in tropical or semi-tropical areas, but once you move out of the temper zone into
1:07.4	the tropics, bats can play a very big role.
1:11.0	In fact, many of the world's most economically important plants are heavily reliant on bats
1:19.1	for pollination.
1:21.9	We probably wouldn't have bananas today if it wasn't for bats.
1:26.3	Bats are key pollinators of the original ancestral bananas.
1:32.5	We wouldn't have tequila for our margaritas.
1:37.8	There are numerous economically important plants.
1:43.5	About 70% of the tropical fruits that we come to appreciate in the marketplace are pollinators
1:53.5	seed dispersed by bats that even gets down to peaches.
1:58.4	They're not pollinated, but they're seed dispersed by bats originally.
2:03.6	If we go to the tequila example and we go to the agave plant that you mentioned in the
	...

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