Background: Pollination is a vital ecosystem service and a key consideration for food security. Despite their importance, pollinators are facing declines throughout the world due to habitat loss, agricultural intensification, pests, disease, and climate change. Pollinating insects require access to suitable plants for foraging, and as native habitats decrease gardens may become increasingly important refuges. We use pollen DNA metabarcoding to investigate which plants different pollinator groups visit throughout the year and the extent to which these can be provided within gardens. Results: The National Botanic Garden of Wales and adjacent organic farmland have been used to assess plant use by different pollinator groups (bumblebees, solitary bees, honeybee, and hoverflies) in order to build a temporal and spatial picture of foraging. Each month, from April to September, all plants in lower throughout the study site were recorded, honey was sampled from six hives (from two apiaries), and wild pollinators were collected from a series of transects. We have used DNA metabarcoding to survey which plants pollinators use by assessing the pollen biodiversity within honey and from the bodies of insects, using rbcL and ITS2. To
complement this work, we have also analysed 475 honey samples provided by beekeepers throughout the UK to survey which plants honeybees use on a wider scale. Initial results show that only a small proportion of available flowering plants are visited by honeybees within a diverse landscape. The greatest proportion of DNA comes from a small number of native plants, including Rubus fruticosus, Trifolium repens, and Taraxacum officinale, supplemented with lower levels of horticultural species. Significance: We are using our findings to develop evidence-based guidance on plants for pollinators and are working with specialist plant nurseries to pilot a “Plants for Pollinators Assurance Scheme”.