There's a lot of buzz over bees, and for good reason—they pollinate most of the food we eat, from cashews to onions to watermelon. Three-quarters of the world’s flowering plants depend on pollinators, but bees don’t have to go it alone. Less famous transporters of pollen, from the African savannas’ towering giraffes to the flies and lizards living in your backyard, play an important role too.

In honor of National Pollinator Week, here’s a roundup of some lesser-known pollinators.

Photo courtesy of USFWS/Tom Koerner

Moths 

“Moths take the pollination night shift,” says Lori Pruitt, a biologist at the US Fish and Wildlife Service. She adds that while not all moths are nocturnal, flowers pollinated by this group of insects are generally open in the late afternoon or evening. Moths focus their efforts on pale or white fragrant flowers.

A May study at University College London found that moth pollen transport networks are larger and more complex than those of daytime pollinators, and that while moths visit a number of the same plants as bees, hoverflies, and butterflies, they also visit many plants largely ignored by these daytime workers. 

You may have mistaken one pollinator in your backyard for another if you’ve ever gotten a dusk visit from a sphinx moth; members of this family of moths, which include more than 1,450 species, are sometimes referred to as hummingbird moths because they hover in the air while feeding. Pruitt adds that sphinx moths are equipped with lengthy tongues to drink nectar from long-throated flowers like trumpet vines.

Photo courtesy of USFWS/Ann Froschauer

Bats

If you’re a tequila lover, thank a bat. Mexican long-nosed bats play a critical role in pollinating the Mexican agave plants so integral to producing the spirit. But a bat’s wheelhouse isn’t limited to agave—more than 300 fruit species, including mangoes, bananas, and guavas, depend on these flying mammals for pollination. 

According to the US Forest Service, bats are important pollinators in desert and tropical habitats. Like moths, they are primarily nighttime workers, feasting on large pale and white flowers with fragrant fermenting or fruitlike odors. Not only do bats slurp up nectar, but they also feed on other flower parts and even the insects found within them. 

Photo courtesy of USFWS/J.Snapp-Cook

Flies

Put down that fly swatter! While they may seem pesky, flies are the primary pollinators of many wild and cultivated plant species. According to Pruitt, they help pollinate a lot of the food we eat—think pears, apples, strawberries, cherries, plums, peaches, parsley, and carrots. 

Like many pollinators, some flies are generalists, focusing on a wide variety of flowers, while others are specialists that excel in pollinating specific flowers. Flies generally focus their efforts on flowers that are pale and dull to dark brown or purple. To attract flies, some flowers have adapted foul-smelling blossoms that mimic rotting meat, Pruitt says. Yum. 

Giraffes

The award for loftiest pollinator goes to the world’s tallest land mammal. These long-necked ungulates munch on the leaves and high-blooming flowers of knobthorn acacia trees, which can reach almost 60 feet tall on African savannas. Giraffes may travel between 16 and 20 hours a day looking for food. As the animals eat, pollen gets stuck to their heads and necks and transfers as they move from treetop to treetop. 

Johan Du Toit, a researcher at Utah State University, first hypothesized that giraffes were working as pollinators while he was doing doctoral research in Kruger National Park in South Africa. A 2006 study he coauthored found that giraffes ate a lot of acacia flowers but didn’t find any direct evidence of giraffe pollination (raising the question as to whether they were acacia predators or pollinators), but Du Toit says his original hypothesis still stands.

“If the consumption of flowers by giraffes were detrimental to knobthorn reproduction,” he says, “then there would be strong evolutionary selection for mechanisms (poison, thorns, etcetera) to prevent it, but there aren’t.” 

Photo courtesy of Jim Hudgins/USFWS

Beetles

The hairier the beetle, the better (when it comes to pollination, that is). That’s because pollen can attach to a beetle’s tiny hairs, helping these insects transport it from flower to flower. According to Pruitt, beetles tend to visit “large, heavily constructed flowers that are either flat or bowl-shaped to give them an easy place to land." She adds that they “are generally clumsy compared to the more delicate insects like butterflies.” Beetles pollinate plants like magnolias and pond lilies; both sport large solitary flowers. 

Lemurs

According to the US Forest Service, Madagascar’s black-and-white ruffed lemurs are the island’s primary pollinator when it comes to the traveler’s palm tree, which towers at 40 feet. The lemurs pull open tough flower bracts and then stick their long snouts and tongues deep inside, getting pollen all over their muzzles and fur. When they travel to the next flower, the pollen travels with them. 

“The resulting fruits are a major source of food,” the USFS’s pollinator page says. “It appears that no other creature has the strength and nimbleness to pollinate the palm.”

Reptiles 

Mounting evidence points to lizards, skinks, and geckos as crucial pollinators too. The Noronha skink, which is native to Brazil, climbs inside the flowers of the leguminous mulungu tree to drink their nectar. As the skinks forage for food, pollen attaches to their scales. Then, as they visit other flowers from the same tree and other trees, they transfer the pollen.

An April 2019 study by South African and Dutch researchers identified the Drakensberg crag lizard as the sole pollinator of the “hidden flower” plant species found at the Maloti-Drakensberg Park World Heritage Site, located in Lesotho and South Africa. This was the first time that researchers identified a lizard pollinator on the continent of Africa. The lizards carry pollen on their snouts after lapping up the nectar from this inconspicuous plant, which is hidden at ground level.