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.

NEWLY INDUCTED FELLOWS of the Entomological Society of America are these three UC professors. From left are Brian Federici and Alexander Raikhel of UC Riverside and Walter Leal of UC Davis. (Courtesy photo)

Our ESA Fellows

December 18, 2009

By Kathy Keatley Garvey

It's a career high. Three University of California professors were among the 10 inducted as Fellows at the Entomological Society of America's annual meeting held Dec. 13-16 in Indianapolis.

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JAY ROSENHEIM, shown here talking to a colleague at a meeting of the Entomological Society of America, is a newly elected Fellow of the American Association for the Advancement of Science. He joined the UC Davis Department of Entomology faculty in 1990. (Photo by Kathy Keatley Garvey)

Double Honor

December 17, 2009

By Kathy Keatley Garvey

It's quite an honor to be elected a Fellow of the American Association for the Advancement of Science (AAAS). And it's a double honor when two persons from the same department at the same university receive the honor the very same year. That's what happened today.

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NO SWEAT--This is a female sweat bee, Halictus ligatus, in the Storer Garden, UC Davis Arboretum. (Photo by Kathy Keatley Garvey)

Great Pollinator Site

December 16, 2009

By Kathy Keatley Garvey

What a treasure! Have you seen the Xerces Society's new online Pollinator Conservation Resource Center? This is something that's long been needed. It's a wealth of information--that's why it's a treasure. As Matthew Shepherd of the Xerces Society for Invertebrate Conservation says: "...

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KELLY LIEBMAN is researching dengue in Peru.

Battling Dengue and Malaria

December 15, 2009

By Kathy Keatley Garvey

Meet Kelly Liebman and Wei Xu. They're graduate students and mosquito researchers in the Department of Entomology, University of California, Davis, who just received the 2009 William Hazeltine Memorial Research Fellowship Awards.

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THIS is a male leafcutting bee, Megachile sp., as identified by native pollinator specialist Robbin Thorp, emeritus professor of entomology at UC Davis. It is nectaring rock purslane, which has a poppylike blossom. (Photo by Kathy Keatley Garvey)

Making the Cut

December 14, 2009

By Kathy Keatley Garvey

The cold, blustery storm that swept over Northern California over the last two weeks wiped out the rock purslane (Calandrinia grandiflora) and with it the "meeting place" of assorted insects: honey bees, leafcutter bees, ladybugs, bumble bees, potter wasps, et al.

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