Bug Squad

When you're drinking your daily cup of Joe to power your day, do you ever think about coffee plantation pests, such as the coffee borer beetle, aka coffee berry borer, Hypothenemus hampei? Agroecologist Estel Jimnez-Soto, a postdoctoral scholar/lecturer at UC Santa Cruz, does.

It's an exciting project and a crucial one.

Just like a UC Davis double-decker bus, plans are moving right along for the UC Davis Biodiversity Museum Day/Month), being celebrated throughout the month of February. Remember last year? On Feb.

"About 90 percent of all bees are actually solitary. So despite kind of the public impression that all bees are like honey bees and bumble bees, we have a lot of these bees that are living on their own.

It's all about the birds and the bees and the flowers and the... Think birds and bats, honey bees and hornets, butterflies and beetles, and the flowers they pollinate. Think yeast cultures and cougars, and nematodes and nightingales, and lions and ladybugs.