Bug Squad

Think back to the first time you spotted a Red Admiral butterfly. You probably admired it and said something like "Ooh, look at that!" That may be how its name originated; someone corrupted "admirable" to "admiral." And mistook "orange" for "red.

The Zika virus is "scarier than we initially thought." So screamed a recent USA Today headline in a quote attributed to the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC).

If you've never seen the "teddy bear bee," keep an eye out for it. A fuzzy golden bee with green eyes, it's the male Valley carpenter bee (Xylocopa varipuncta). Last Friday we saw it foraging in the half-acre Haagen-Dazs Honey Bee Haven on Bee Biology Road, University of California, Davis.

If you attended the 141st annual Dixon May Fair, held May 5-8, and saw the honey bee display in Madden Hall, you probably heard the buzz. In keeping with the theme, "Buzzing with Excitement," bees buzzed in the bee observation hives as fairgoers singled out the queen bee, worker bees and drones.

You don't have to crane your neck to see the crane flies. They're everywhere. They're zigzagging around your yard, bumping into walls and windows, landing on your screen door and fence, and clustering on your porch lights, all the while searching for mates. They're in your garden, home and garage.