Havana's urban farmers can out-plant pollinator losses from paving
Duarte S, Desutter-Grandcolas L, Gandara T, Ropars L, Machon N
Urban Ecology
If you tend a city plot or community garden, this shows that packing in more blooms can buffer your pollinators against the concrete creeping in around you.
Researchers tracked flower visits by bees, flies, ants, and other pollinators on 16 city farms in Havana, Cuba, some surrounded by lots of pavement and buildings, others with more open space. As urban sprawl increased, farms lost most of their plant variety and many pollinators like small wild bees and hoverflies showed up less. But farms that kept more flowers blooming, even in a smaller space, still attracted good pollinator activity, suggesting that thoughtful planting can help city farms keep their crops pollinated even as the city grows around them.
Key Findings
Plant richness dropped by about 90% and farm area shrank as impervious (paved) cover rose from 38% to 97% across the 16 farms studied.
Small wild bees, ants, and hoverflies consistently declined with urbanization in both 2023 and 2024, while flies showed the opposite trend, increasing with more paved cover.
Higher floral abundance consistently boosted visits from honey bees and other wild pollinators, and urbanization's negative effect on total pollinator interactions was strong in 2023 but weaker and more mixed in 2024.
chevron_right Technical Summary
A two-year study of urban farms in Havana found that as cities pave over more land, wild bees, ants, and hoverflies visit crop flowers less often, but growing more flowers on-site helps offset that loss and keeps pollination services running.
Abstract Preview
Original paper
Contrasting responses of pollinators to urbanization and local management in urban farms of Havana.
Urban expansion reshapes ecological interactions in agroecosystems, yet its effects on plant-pollinator interactions remain poorly documented in tropical cities. We assessed how landscape urbanizat...
open_in_new Read full abstractAbstract copyright held by the original publisher.
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Pollinators are animals—such as bees, butterflies, birds, and other insects—that transfer pollen from a flower's anther to its stigma, enabling fertilization and seed production. This process underpins plant reproductive success and genetic diversity, making pollinator research essential for
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