Bug Squad

If you've ever been to Angel Island or Alcatraz Island in the San Francisco Bay, you may have seen them. Bumble bees. And sometimes if you're fishing in the Bay, a bumble bee may land on your boat.

Ever seen honey bees engaging in washboarding? It's a behavior so named because they look as if they're scrubbing clothes on a washboard or scrubbing their home. It occurs near the entrance of the hive and only with worker bees. They go back and forth, back and forth, a kind of rocking movement.

Varroa mites, those pesky little parasites that suck the blood out of honey bees and spread multiple viruses, are now found throughout the world, except in Australia.

If you want to take photos of honey bees in flight, do so early in the morning. They don't move as fast and the lighting is to die for. This morning we stepped out in our yard, steaming coffee in hand, and watched the honey bees foraging among the lavender blossoms.

Remember the news published several years ago about a scientist who discovered a two-inch-long bat with a tongue longer than its body, so long that it had to tuck it into its rib cage?