URBANA — Fluttering quietly and steadily from flower to flower, butterflies, bees, and other pollinators do the hard background work of fertilizing flowering plants, fruits, and crops. But these unsung heroes are in danger. Studies have shown that an estimated 40% of insect species, including the monarch butterfly, are threatened with extinction in the coming decades, largely due to habitat loss.
“The entomological community is gripped by this looming crisis, but the public doesn’t even know about it,” says May Berenbaum, an entomologist at the University of Illinois.
Now there’s a way for backyard gardeners in rural and urban areas to help. For the fourth time, the University of Illinois Extension is calling on all lovers of bees, butterflies, and every pollinator in between to join scientists in the I-Pollinate collaborative research project.
FARM AND GARDEN: Leaping worms will not spoil the upcoming plant sale
Using flower gardens at home, either in the ground or in containers, I-Pollinate volunteers of all ages can observe pollinators and submit data to track their distribution and habitats.
Volunteers spend time outdoors, often with friends and young family members, learning about scientific research, plants and pollinators. Illinois Extension horticultural educator Kelly Allsup works with project volunteers.
“We’re learning how to determine what’s in our gardens, but also about the scientific process,” says Allsup. “Nor data is data that scientists need to make recommendations about which plants can support pollinators.”
Researchers have three projects that the public can participate in. One focuses on planting a study garden to see which landscaping ornamental pollinators are food sources. Another tracks monarch butterfly eggs and caterpillars.
The I-Pollinate BeeSpotter project records bumblebee and honey bee sightings to help create accurate distribution maps for Illinois. Reports from rural areas are very helpful. He says they hope more people in rural areas will get involved.
Those interested in helping scientists conserve pollinators can learn more about the project at ipollinate.illinois.edu. Volunteers are being trained on how to collect data, with the first collection starting in June.
My Town: Clint Walker’s Memoirs of Coles County from the Archives
Cosmic Blue Comics
From the Journal Gazette of November 22, 1992, this photo by Cosmic Blue Comics in Mattoon; where I spent practically every Saturday afternoon for about two years. That little back room to the right of the Coca-Cola sign was where the many, I mean many, long crates of old issues were kept. I still have my boxed copy of Tales of the Beanworld issue #1 that I found there. Unfortunately, this place is now just a “green space”.
Mattoon Arcade

Pictured is Shelbyville’s Bob Murray from the June 2, 1982 Journal Gazette demonstrating his dominance over the TRON arcade game at the “Carousel Time” arcade in the Cross County Mall, which would later become Aladdin’s Castle, to soon after no longer being a thing no more. I spent almost every Saturday in this arcade, maybe with the exact same hairdo. However, without overalls. I was more of an “Ocean Pacific” kid.
Icenogles

Pictured November 28, 1988, Journal Gazette, Icenogle Grocery Store. Being from Cooks Mills, we didn’t shop at Icenogle’s often… but when we did, I knew from a young age that’s how a grocery store should be in a perfect world, and not just because she had it Wooden floors, comics on magazine racks, or lots, and I mean lots of trading cards in wax packs.
cooks mills

By the time this showcase article about Adam’s Groceries appeared in the Journal Gazette of June 13, 1998, I had long since moved away from Cooks Mills, but there was a time when I could very well have been one of those kids in this photograph; because if it was summer and you had a bike and you lived in Cooks Mills, that’s where you ended up. According to last report they still had Tab in the Pepsi cooler on the back. I am seriously considering asking my money man if I could afford to reopen this place.
Mr Music

Pictured from the Journal Gazette, July 16, 1987, this ad for Mister Music, formerly located on the Cross County Mall. I didn’t buy records at that age, but eventually I would and it all went under. If you think hanging out with your buddies at a record store on a Friday night with a hot driver’s license fresh in your wallet doesn’t sound ‘cool’, you’re right. But it’s the best a geek like me could do. Wherever you are today, Mister Music owners, please know that a Minutemen album I found in your cheap bin changed my life.
Sound source guitar throw

Portrait of the author as a young man attempting to throw a guitar through a target at this year’s Sound Source Music Guitar Throwing Contest, April 18, 1994, Journal Gazette. Check out my grunge era hoodie, and yes… look closely, those are Air Jordans you see on my feet. Addendum: Contrary to the cutline, I didn’t win a guitar.
Pictured, clipped from the online archives at JG-TC.com, an April 18, 1994 photograph, Journal Gazette of Sound Source Music Guitar Throwing Contest winner and current JG-TC employee Clint Walker.
vets

Here Today, Gone Tomorrow, Vette’s Teen Club, from the Journal Gazette June 20, 1991. I wasn’t “cool” enough to hang around behind Vette in his “heyday,” and by “cool enough” I mean “not practiced enough.” in parking lot fights”. If only I could dare now.
FutureGen

FutureGen: The End of the Beginning and Eventually the Beginning of the End, December 19, 2007, JG-TC. I wish I had paid more attention back then. I probably should have read the newspaper.
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