Bug Squad

The Gulf Fritillary, Agraulis vanillae, and the Mexican sunflower, Tithonia rotundifola, seem made for one another. Both are a showy orange. Both are show-stoppers. And both attract a photographer's eye. Especially when a Gulf Frit flutters over a Tithonia on a warm sunny day in a Vacaville garden.

So here's this praying mantis, a female Mantis religiosa, tucked beneath a Mexican sunflower, Tithonia rotundifola, in a Vacaville garden. She's as still as a stone, and you know how still stones are. Along comes a honey bee, Apis mellifera. She's packing a load of orange pollen.

Holiday? What holiday? It's Labor Day, but honey bees aren't relaxing. They're out in force collecting nectar, pollen, water and propolis.

There aren't that many nematologists who can say their career spans 64 years. UC Davis Distinguished Professor Emeritus Howard Ferris can.

Remember Rebecca Jean "RJ" Millena? She's the little Concord, Calif., kindergarten student who declared--on the very first day of class-- "When I grow up, I want to be an entomologist!" And she did.