Bug Squad

So here's this tiny praying mantis hovering over a spider's web in the bluebeard (Caryopteris clandonensis) in our pollinator garden. In the web are freshly caught prey, including a honey bee.

A bumble bee news story released today by Andy Fell of UC Davis News and Media Relations is a great example of scientific collaboration between entomologists and engineers.

Dear Crab Spider, Please don't eat the pollinators. You may help yourself to a mosquito, a crane fly, a lygus bug, an aphid, and a katydid, not necessarily in that order. And more than one if you like.

Today we celebrate the Fourth of July, also known as Independence Day. History books tell us that on July 4, 1776, the Continental Congress adopted the Declaration of Independence, declaring the 13 colonies a new nation and no longer part of the British Empire.

What's better than sighting a yellow-faced bumble bee, Bombus vosnesenskii? Well, a newly emerged Bombus vosnesenskii queen. On the last day of June, we spotted this fresh queen-looking foraging on our blanket flower (Gaillardia).