Attracting pollinators to your vegetable garden
Last reviewed September 2026 · written from public-domain USDA/NOAA data and Cooperative Extension references — see how we source data
Squash, cucumbers, melons and most other fruiting vegetables need a pollinator visit to nearly every flower to set a full, well-shaped fruit. A garden that supports pollinators through the season simply yields better than one that does not.
Why pollinators matter to yield
Poor pollination shows up as small, lopsided, or partly unfilled fruit — a half-pollinated squash blossom still makes a fruit, just a misshapen one. Companion planting that brings in more visiting insects directly improves fruit set on these crops.
Plants that bring them in
Let a few herbs bolt to flower — basil, cilantro and dill are especially good at it. Tuck in borage, sweet alyssum, and single-flowered (not double or frilly) zinnias and cosmos near the vegetable beds; single flowers give pollinators easier access to nectar than heavily doubled ornamental varieties.
Give them more than flowers
A shallow dish of water with pebbles for landing spots helps in hot weather. Leave a little bare, undisturbed soil or a small brush pile — most native bees are solitary ground- or stem-nesters, not hive-builders, and need somewhere to nest close to the flowers they visit.
What undoes the effort
A broad-spectrum insecticide applied while anything nearby is in flower kills visiting pollinators along with the target pest. If a spray is ever necessary, applying it in the evening after pollinators have left for the day reduces — though does not eliminate — the harm.