Bug Squad

Along about this time of year, the calls come pouring into the UC Davis Department of Entomology and Nematology and the Bohart Museum of Entomology. "I just saw a golden bumble bee.

Monarchs and milkweed are in the news again. As well they should be. The declining monarch population, coupled with the decreasing scarcity of their host plant, the milkweed, is disturbing. The larvae of the monarch butterfly (Danaus plexippus) feed exclusively on milkweeds.

It may not be the farmer's friend, but it's the beekeeper's friend. Wild radish (Raphanus raphanistrum), a member of the mustard family, Brassicaceae, is considered a weed, but I consider it a flowering plant for bees when I see it along roadsides and parks and lining orchards and vineyards.

The painted ladies are on move. Butterflies. Scores of painted ladies (Vanessa cardui) are now migrating north from their overwintering sites near the U.S. Mexico border.

In recent years, honey bees received neither recognition nor respect until commercial beekeeper David Hackenberg of Pennsylvania/Florida sounded the alarm in 2006 about his missing honey bees.