I made a video of the flying insects that are drawn to the native wildflowers in my tiny back yard.
The pink flower heads are joe pye weed, and the white flower clusters are white boneset (late boneset).
The red flowers that the eastern tiger swallowtails love are tithonia (Mexican sunflowers).
So far, the white boneset flowers attract the most insects and the greatest diversity of insects that I have observed. Their flower clusters will sometimes be covered with 5 or 6 species at the same time, mostly native bees and wasps of various odd types, plus the usual honeybees, bumblebees, and butterflies.
All of this video was filmed within 10 feet of my back door.
The density and diversity of pollinator insects has exploded in the past 6 years since I started replacing my small urban lawn with native wildflowers.
When you plant select native species of wildflowers, the birds and insects that depend on them will quickly colonize your yard, even if the lot is small.
The biodiversity increases exponentially because every tiny species that colonizes the space is quickly followed by other tiny species that eat it.
If your small yard is near other yards with wildflowers or parks or preserves or utility right-of-ways, then your yard is part of a chain of habitat that supports a diversity of species.
I’m fortunate to have those types of properties near my house, and so I am noticing new insect species each summer. Things like odd-colored damselflies and blue wasps are becoming as common-place as the dragonflies.
With the two small mosquito-fish ponds I dug, my wildflower meadow has fresh water, making it the complete habitat, and so it shouldn’t be surprising, but it is.
Each time I notice a new species of insect, it makes me wonder what would be possible if just a few more people restored their lawns to native meadow.