NASHVILLE, Tenn. (AP) - Weaving confidently through the woods around Shelby Bottoms Nature Center, 17-year-old Anna-Christina Laporte chatted about declining bee populations and how pollinators are needed to sustain the global food supply.
The teen, who goes by Christina, set her sights on becoming an Eagle Scout as soon as Boy Scouts began allowing girls into the program in February 2019. She joined Troop 934 in Mt. Juliet and started working toward her goal, going on to earn a total of 109 badges.
Laporte built pollinator “hotels” at Shelby Bottoms as part of her Eagle Scout project. The hotels serve as alternative homes for bees and pollinators that lost their original habitats or were pushed out of their colonies by others.
Now she’s one of the first female Eagle Scouts in the nation, earning her status earlier this month.
“I have the opportunity to be one of the first girls to get it and to start something else for other girls along the way. I can carve that path for them,” Laporte said.
Her mother, Brandi Laporte, said that some Scouts who are boys may have been working on their Eagle Scout status as early as age 10. For her daughter, the timeline was accelerated to meet the requirements before she turned 18.
“They had to meet every single requirement that every boy has to meet,” Brandi Laporte said. “Depending on your age, the maximum amount of time you had to do it in was 24 months.”
Her daughter did it in 19 months.
Eagle Scouts are required to earn 21 badges, hold leadership positions for six months and complete a project as a Life Scout. The inaugural class of female Eagle Scouts will be recognized by Scouts BSA in February 2021, according to the organization’s website.
Why pollinators matter so much
Rusty patched bumblebees were listed as endangered for the first time in 2017, among dramatically declining populations in other species of bees in recent decades.
Bees are responsible for pollinating most of the plants that require insect pollination to produce fruits, seeds and nuts.
Without pollination, crops will fail, putting the humans and animals who depend on them at risk. The reduction is believed to be caused by a combination of habitat loss, disease, pesticide use, climate change and an extremely small population size.
Laporte said she was inspired to do her project at Shelby Bottoms after she worked with Metro Parks naturalist John Michael Cassidy to earn three of her merit badges.
The hotels are built into frames made of pine and filled with bamboo, cedar, walnut and cardboard for pollinators to tuck into. Several were installed along the exterior walls of the Shelby Bottoms Nature Center.
‘The leaders of tomorrow’
Cassidy said Shelby Bottoms has worked to create or preserve habitats for other pollinators as well, such as monarch butterflies. He said a recent bloom of a field of tickseed sunflowers in the park drew thousands of pollinators like soldier beetles, along with scores of curious onlookers.
Cassidy said Nashville residents can make space to draw and sustain pollinators in their own yards by using fewer chemicals. He said they can also create “wild zones” where native perennial plants and weedy-yard flowers like dandelions and clover can serve as a food source for pollinators.
“We are so incredibly grateful to our Scouts for all they do for parks,” Shelby Bottoms Nature Center director Denise Weyer said in an email. “Christina was our first female Eagle Scout, and we couldn’t be more proud of her! It is a real privilege to work with such dedicated and passionate young leaders, and Eagle Scouts are definitely the leaders of tomorrow.”
While Laporte doesn’t have plans to build more pollinator hotels, she said she hopes her project will inspire others to do the same.
“I’d like to leave that open for other Scouts to come along and leave their little footprint,” she said.
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