Bug Squad

Welcome to the Bug Squad blog! The Bug Squad blog was launched Aug. 6, 2008 and is a daily blog (Monday through Friday). It showcases entomologists and the work they do. The blog focuses on scientists in the UC Davis Department of Entomology and Nematology, the Bohart Museum of Entomology, Harry H. Laidlaw Jr. Honey Bee Research Facility, the UC Davis Bee Haven, and assorted campuswide events, including UC Davis Picnic Day, UC Davis Biodiversity Museum Day, and Bohart Museum open houses. The blog spotlights insects, including bees, butterflies, dragonflies, and praying mantises, as well as arachnids such as jumping spiders and crab spiders. Author and photographer is Kathy Keatley Garvey, communications specialist, UC Davis Department of Entomology and Nematology, and a longtime journalist and community scientist with two degrees from Washington State University. She is a member of the Entomological Society of America (ESA) and the Association for Communication Excellence (ACE). Her blog posts and images have won international awards from ACE and ESA and appeared on journal and magazine covers. She shoots primarily with a Nikon Z-8 mirrorless camera, a Nikon D500 and Nikon 800, with assorted macro lenses.

A cabbage white heads for catmint in a garden in Vacaville, Calif. (Photo by Kathy Keatley Garvey)

Beer-for-a-Butterfly Contest Is Over

February 4, 2020

By Kathy Keatley Garvey

If you were thinking of trying to net a cabbage white butterfly to win Art Shapiro's "Beer-for-a-Butterfly Contest"--a butterfly for a pitcher of beer, or its equivalent--you're too late. The contest is over. No winner this year.

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A syrphid, also known as a hover fly or flower fly, nectars on a tower of jewels, Echium wildpretii, in Vacaville, Calif. (Photo by Kathy Keatley Garvey)

Andrew Young: Natural History of Syrphids, from Pollinators to Parasitoids

February 3, 2020

By Kathy Keatley Garvey

At first glance, they're often mistaken for bees, but bees they are not. They're flies. You've probably seen them hovering over flowers, which is why syprhids are commonly called "hover flies" or "flower flies." Enter Andrew Young.

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Lynn Kimsey, director of the Bohart Museum of Entomology, with part of the tardigrade collection. The Bohart collection includes some 25,000 slide-mounted specimens. (Photo by Kathy Keatley Garvey)

Oh, for a Water Bear Sculpture at the Bohart Museum!

January 31, 2020

By Kathy Keatley Garvey

If you can picture a huge water bear (tardigrade) sculpture gracing the entrance to the Bohart Museum of Entomology on Crocker Lane, UC Davis campus, the scientists need your help to make it happen.

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A monarch in flight in the summer of 2017 in Vacaville, Calif. This is the non-native tropical milkweed, Asclepias curassavica.(Photo by Kathy Keatley Garvey)

A Monarch Sighting in January? In Sacramento? Yes!

January 30, 2020

By Kathy Keatley Garvey

News flash: Monarch sighting in Sacramento! Butterfly guru Art Shapiro, UC Davis distinguished professor of evolution and ecology, spotted a monarch in Sacramento on Wednesday, Jan. 29--way, way, way early to see monarchs in this area. But it wasn't in his transect.

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This is the tsetse fly, Glossina morsitans morsitans, that Geoffrey Attardo researches in his UC Davis lab. (Photo by Geoffrey Attardo)

Geoffrey Attardo's Tiny Subjects Drawing Large-Scale Attention

January 29, 2020

By Kathy Keatley Garvey

UC Davis medical entomologist-geneticist Geoffrey Attardo's tiny research subjects in Tupper Hall are receiving widespread attention on a very large scale. In less than 48 hours, nearly 500,000 people have seen thembut not in his restricted-access lab.

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