CASSOPOLIS — Wearing a set of bright orange butterfly wings and handing out free seeds for people to plant, Cass County Conservation District Administrator Korie Blyveis talked to Cass County residents Tuesday about how they can encourage pollination in their communities.

“Pollinator gardening is what we are here talking about today,” Blyveis said, clearing her throat. “We are going to go back to basics.”

The Cass County Conservation District hosted a presentation titled “Beyond Milkweed: What Other Plants Attract and Support Pollinators?” at the Cass County Council on Aging Tuesday as part of the district’s ongoing conservation series with the COA. The presentation was shown at 1 p.m. at the Cassopolis COA location and 6 p.m. at the Dowagiac COA location.

Presented by Blyveis and Bill Westrate, who has worked with the conservation district in the past, the program focused on different types of pollinators — including butterflies, bees and hummingbirds — and the different plants that Cass County residents could plant to attract those pollinators. During the presentation, Westrate passed around visual aids and pinned insects to help attendees be able to recognize different species of pollinators.

Program attendees took careful notes and pictures of PowerPoint slides about the different pollinator species and what plants they could add to their gardens to attract pollinating animals. One of the main pieces of advice Blyveis and Westrate offered to visitors looking to create their own pollinator garden was to plant various and colorful plants.

“Bees and butterflies like pink and purple flowers,” Blyveis said.

Encouraging pollination has been a goal of the conservation district for some time as pollination is vital to ensuring that plants, including food crops, survive, Blyveis said.

During the district’s annual tree sale in April, the district sold plants that would encourage pollination, which Blyveis said is one of the focuses of the sale. At the time, Blyveis said she would encourage anyone to plant flowering plants and fruits in order to encourage pollination and have a positive impact on the environment.

“Without pollination, many food plants that rely on pollinators cannot produce the fruits that we eat,” Blyveis said. “It’s not just bees that are doing all the work. Butterflies, birds, beetles, bats, wasps and even flies are important to the pollination process, and monarchs have become symbolic of their plight as numbers have been declining due to several factors.”

The conservation series with the COA will continue through September. The next event will take place at 1 p.m. June 25 at the COA, 60525 Decatur Road, Cassopolis.