Bug Squad

If you're traveling toor living in--a Zika virus-infested area, it's far better to use DEET rather than Picaridin and to use higher, rather than lower, doses of DEET because lower doses do not work well with older mosquitoes, newly published research from the University of California, Davis and Reci...

"Bio" means "life" or "living things," and that's just what you'll see on Saturday, Feb. 18 at the sixth annual UC Davis Biodiversity Museum Day. You'll see plenty of life and previous life, from bugs to bones--that is, from walking sticks to dinosaur bones.

On Valentine's Day, it's inaccurate to say that "everything is coming up roses." Not everything. Think jumping spiders on flowers. They come up, too. Take that jumping spider (family Salticidae) perched on a red trumpetlike vine at the Benicia Marina, Solano County. It was not alone.

There she was--a gorgeous orange-and-black butterfly sipping nectar from a rosemary bush near the Glen Cove Marina, Vallejo. She seemed so out of place and out of season. It was Sunday morning, Feb.

It's almond pollination season in California but the weather refuses to cooperate. Heavy rains, high winds, intense flooding. What are the bees to do? They're holed up in their hives, waiting for the sun breaks.