Ann Hammond spent years restoring her 12-acre Iowa property with native habitat; years later, a federally endangered bumblebee appeared among her flowers

• Representative image Image credits: Wikimedia CommonsFor years, Ann Hammond worked to transform her 12-acre Iowa property into a welcoming place for native plants and wildlife.
• The effort eventually brought an extraordinary visitor to her flowers: a rusty patched bumblebee, a species listed as federally endangered in the United States.
• As reported by Iowa Public Radio, Hammond noticed the rare pollinator in 2021, several years after beginning her habitat restoration work.