Port Barrington to showcase pollinator habitat Saturday at River Fest

The village of Port Barrington will showcase its new pollinator habitat creation and enhancement area at River Fest on Saturday.

River Fest was inspired by Friends of the Fox River’s “It’s Our Fox River Day,” during which events and clean-ups are planned up and down the Fox River. Port Barrington’s event will include the village’s annual picnic.

The Village Hall rain garden and bee habitat was created last summer and signage was installed recently using funds received in part from a ComEd Green Region grant, according to a news release.

Four educational mini gardens incorporate native plantings specifically chosen to house and feed pollinators.

One is a vegetative swale that turned a mowed culvert into a garden for pollinators. The second is a prairie-style strip equipped with blooms and rain barrels. Third is a rain garden that catches water from a Village Hall downspout and hosts native plants. And the fourth is a patch of former asphalt in the middle of a parking lot was converted into a nectar bar.

Port Barrington also recently received a Powering Communities grant from ComEd and the Metropolitan Mayor’s Caucus to fund the purchase of an electric vehicle for municipal use, according to the release.