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Bug Squad

Bug Squad blog image depicts a honey bee sting in action.

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. Feedspot lists it as one of the top entomology blogs on the Internet. 

A honey bee heads for an almond blossom in Davis, Calif. (Photo by Kathy Keatley Garvey)

The Almond and the Bee

March 30, 2015
By Kathy Keatley Garvey
Remember Stephanie Hsia? She's the beekeeper/graduate student at Harvard's Graduate School of Design who traveled through almond orchards in California's Sacramento and San Joaquin valleys in May 2014 to illustrate and pen a book about the spatial relationship between honey bees and almonds.
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Long-distance view of a pink Cosmos with a "green" center. (Photo by Kathy Keatley Garvey)

How Green Is Your Cosmos?

March 26, 2015
By Kathy Keatley Garvey
The vibrant colors of Cosmos, an annual flower with the same common name as its genus, are spectacular. But we especially like the showstopping pink Cosmos with its bright yellow center. Well, sometimes, they have a green center--that's when an ultra green sweat bee is foraging.
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James Carey teaching a UC Davis chemistry class “how to make one-minute videos on the properties of the elements in periodic tables.” The result: 540 one-minute videos, probably a world record. (Photo by Kathy Keatley Garvey)

It's Like Winning the Triple Crown

March 25, 2015
By Kathy Keatley Garvey
It's like winning the triple crown. The Pacific Branch of the Entomological Society of America (PBESA) has announced that two distinguished professors and a graduate student from the Department of Entomology and Nematology, University of California, Davis, have won major awards.
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George Kennedy, the William Neal Reynolds Distinguished Professor of Agriculture at North Carolina State University, stopped to count thrips during a vacation to Mt. St. Helens. (Photo by Scott Kennedy)

Targeting Thrips

March 24, 2015
By Kathy Keatley Garvey
If you grow tomatoes, you ought to be concerned about thrips. They're pests of fruits, vegetable and horticultural crops, including tomatoes, grapes, strawberries and soybeans. They're barely visible to the naked eye, but oh, how disastrous they can be.
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