Bug Squad

A 19th century nursery rhyme insists that little girls are made of "sugar and spice and everything nice." They're not, of course. And neither are butterflies always "pretty." They can be "pretty gross," according to a delightful children's picture book, "Butterflies Are Pretty...

It's early morning and the spider is hungry. It snares a honey bee foraging for pollen and nectar in a patch of Mexican sunflowers (Tithonia rotundifola) in a Vacaville pollinator garden. The spider slides down the sticky web, kills its prey with a venomous bite, and begins to eat.

You don't want to "get the red out" when a flameskimmer dragonfly visits your garden. You want to let Big Red to stay in. This male flameskimmer hung out in our pollinator garden in Vacaville on July 3 for a little over five hours.

This is not something you see every day.

We're used to admiring street art that showcases such iconic insects as lady beetles, dragonflies and butterflies, but carpenter ants? Carpenter ants? If you walk over the Ulatis Creek Bridge, Vacaville, to enter Andrews Park for the Fourth of July celebration on Sunday, you may be surprised.