Bug Squad

If you've been ignoring your calendar, you may have not realized that autumn began Sept. 23. We know it as the season between summer and winter, when days grow shorter, when liquidambar leaves turn red, and when the blanket flower lives up to its name.

Did you know that tsetse flies give birth to live offspring?

Visitors at the Bohart Museum of Entomology open house learned about such "household vampires" as mosquitoes, fleas, lice, ticks and bedbugs, and many also participated in the family arts-and-crafts activities.

They saw mosquitoes, ticks, fleas, lice and bed bugs at the Bohart Museum of Entomology open house on "Household Vampires." They learned that "medical entomologist is the study of arthropods (such as insects and ticks) that spread pathogens that cause human disease.

"Understanding the Dynamics of Plant-Animal Interactions in a Changing World." That's the title of conservation ecologist Paul CaraDonna's seminar that he'll present to the UC Davis Department of Entomology and Nematology from 4:10 to 5 p.m., Monday, Oct. 2 in 122 Briggs Hall, UC Davis campus.