Bug Squad

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.

HONEY BEE lies still on a white calla lily in the Carolee Shields White Flower Garden at the UC Davis Arboretum. (Photo by Kathy Keatley Garvey)

Death on a Calla Lily

March 30, 2010

By Kathy Keatley Garvey

It probably wasn't colony collapse disorder. Probably not pesticides, a disease, malnutrition or stress, either. It could have been a pest.

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FIRST SPEAKER--Julien Pelletier, a postdoctoral scholar in the Walter Leal chemical ecology lab at UC Davis, is the first speaker in the UC Davis Department of Entomology spring seminar series. His topic: "Mining the Genome for Olfactory Proteins." (Photo by Kathy Keatley Garvey)

Bugs, Bugs & Bugs

March 29, 2010

By Kathy Keatley Garvey

If spring has sprung--and it has--it's also time to spring forward the next batch of noonhour seminars at the UC Davis Department of Entomology. The spring lectures are held every Wednesday, March 31 through May 26, from 12:10 to 1 p.m., in 122 Briggs Hall, Kleiber Drive.

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A JUST RELEASED ladybug prowls a rose bush for aphids. (Photo by Kathy Keatley Garvey)

Fly Away Home

March 26, 2010

By Kathy Keatley Garvey

"I'm a ladybug. Please, take me home. I want to live in your garden. I like to eat aphids. Aphids are tiny green insects that are harmful to plants." "Just like the Grange, I'm a friend to the farmer and you.

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UC DAVIS BEEKEEPER Elizabeth "Liz" Frost tends bees at the Harry H. Laidlaw Jr. Honey Bee Research Facility. (Photo by Kathy Keatley Garvey)

Bees Still in Trouble

March 25, 2010

By Kathy Keatley Garvey

The news is not good. The honey bee crisis is worsening. Back in November of 2006, commercial beekeeper David Hackenberg of Pennsylvania sounded the alarm. Fifty 50 percent of his bees had collapsed in Florida.

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CALIFORNIA SECRETARY OF AGRICULTURE A. G. Kawamura (center) greets Lynn Kimsey, director of the Bohart Museum of Entomology and professor and vice chair of the UC Davis Department of Entomology. At right is Extension apiculturist Eric Mussen, also a member of the UC Davis entomology faculty and parliamentarian of the California State Beekeepers' Association. (Photo by Kathy Keatley Garvey)

The Buzz on the State Capitol Lawn

March 24, 2010

By Kathy Keatley Garvey

When the annual California Agriculture Day took place yesterday on the state capitol grounds, thousands of visitors buzzed the booths learning more about the food they eat and the agriculturists that provide it. But that wasn't the only buzz.

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