Reflecting on 2025 🐝

Reflecting on 2025 🐝

As this year comes to a close, I've been thinking about the moments that made all the miles, the early mornings, and the specimen processing worth it. Here are my top 10 (though I could easily come up with about 1,000 more) in no particular order:

1. The Entomological Society of America Conference
Walking into a room full of scientists wearing bee blouses, beetle button-ups, and skirts covered in ants. It felt like finding my people. The fashion was incredible, but what really mattered was the community—everyone genuinely excited about each other's work, asking questions, offering to collaborate. I came home inspired.

2. Finding Bombus occidentalis at North Bridger Bison
The western bumble bee is listed as vulnerable, and there she was—thriving on a working bison ranch. It's exactly what we're trying to prove: that agriculture and threatened species don't have to be at odds. Seeing her felt like validation for all of this work.

3. Standing in Ten Hectares of Maximilian Sunflowers
At the Dakota Partnership Ranch, I walked into what can only be described as a superboom—ten hectares of Maximilian sunflowers absolutely covered in bees. The sound, the movement, the sheer abundance of life. I stopped the side-by-side every time I drove by it and wandered into the middle to ooh and aah at the spectacle. This is what healthy prairie can look like.

4. Baby Bison Season
Spending time with "red dogs" (what ranchers call baby bison) at two of our partner ranches this spring was maybe the highlight of my year. There's something about watching these 40-pound orange fluffballs do their zoomies that just fills you with delight (and hope). New life on landscapes that support both megafauna and charismatic mini fauna (aka, bees).

5. Heart of the West Retreat at J Bar L Ranch
Being part of this retreat reminded me why community matters so much. Watching women who work incredibly hard on their own operations and businesses take time to rest, connect, and support each other—it was powerful. This is the kind of space we need more of.

6. Collaborating with Farm to Crag in Bozeman
I didn't expect to be talking about pollinators at a climbing event, but that's what made it so good. Bringing bees into conversations with people who care deeply about public lands and outdoor spaces—it's all connected. Unexpected partnerships often end up being the most meaningful.

7. "The Thing About Bees" Curriculum Reaches Pine Ridge Reservation
Working with Tara to create educational curriculum was fulfilling on its own, but knowing it's now being used at the Maȟpíya Lúta school on Pine Ridge Reservation near one of our ranch partners? That feels important. Education that reaches kids who live on the landscapes we're studying—that matters.

8. "Bees, Beavers, and Bears, Oh My!" Event at Crazy D Ranch
Twenty-five people gathered in Melville, Montana to talk about coexistence—how pollinators, predators, and people can share landscapes. The conversations that happened that day, the questions people asked, the connections they made between their own land and what they were learning—this is why we host field days.

9. The Super Bloom at Sampson Creek Preserve
Wildflowers everywhere. Happy, healthy honey bees. A record honey harvest. Sometimes nature just does her thing when we give her the space and the right conditions. Witnessing that abundance never gets old.

10. Planting Spring at Weisinger's Vineyard
We covered the vineyard in flower seeds that will bloom next spring. I won't see them for months, but I already know they'll be beautiful. There's something hopeful about planting for a future you haven't seen yet.

These moments don't happen in isolation. They happen because of you—the people who donate, who share our work, who believe that pollinators and agriculture can coexist.

Your support funds the campervan that logged 11,590 miles this year. It pays for the seeds we plant, the research equipment we need, the partnerships we build. It makes it possible for me to spend my time doing this work instead of constantly chasing funding.

We have eight days left in 2025. If you've been thinking about year-end giving, or if any of these moments resonated with you, I hope you'll consider supporting Bee Regenerative.

Every donation—whether it's $25 or $250—makes a difference.

Donate here: https://support.beegirl.org/loveyourbees

Thank you for making 2025 possible. Here's to what we'll discover together in 2026.