The decline of pollinating insects such as bees and butterflies have been a hot topic recently. Like a lot of hot topics in agriculture, farmers seem to be caught in the middle of a blame game being played by several outside organizations and interests.

While fingers are pointed and the shouting gets louder, many farmers simply want to know what they can do to help pollinators.

That’s why the Minnesota Corn Growers Association (MCGA) has released the MCGA Pollinators Guide, a simple, practical 2-page guide designed to help farmers take real-world steps to make their farms more pollinator-friendly.

“We made our guide as practical as possible in order to reduce the noise surrounding this issue and allow farmers to focus on actually taking action to help pollinators on their own farms,” said MCGA President Ryan Buck, who farms near Goodhue.

MCGA will be distributing the new pollinator guide, along with free packets of pollinator-friendly wildflower seeds, at its Farmfest tent next week (the MCGA tent is located at the corner of Seed Road and 7th St.).

You can also view the MCGA Pollinator Guide online.