Bug Squad

 It's April Fool's Day and a good time to ask: "How many of you have been fooled thinking a syrphid fly is a bee?"To the untrained eye, everything that lands on a flower is a bee! However, syrphid flies, also known as hover flies or flower flies, are easily distinguished for honey bees:Syrphid…

 "The little things run the world," mused entomologist, biologist, naturalist and ecologist E. O. Wilson (1929-2023).He was referring to "the disproportionate role that they and other invertebrates play in food webs, ecosystem services, and generating and maintaining biological diversity," according to…

 Hey, lygus bug, that bud's not for you!Our yellow rose bushes, "Sparkle and Shine,"  purchased in May of 2013 at the California Center for Urban Horticulture (CCUH) Annual Rose Day at the University of California, Davis, are budding and blooming again.The roses usuually bud and bloom in late…

 Some folks call them "Mosquito Hawks" or "Daddy Long Legs" or "Skeeter Eaters."  They're not hawks, they're not arachnids, and they don't eat mosquitoes.They are crane flies, members of the family Tipulidae of the order Diptera (flies). With the temperatures rising, they're everywhere now,…

 When the exciting news broke today that molecular geneticist and physiologist Joanna Chiu, professor and chair of the UC Davis Department of Entomology and Nematology and a professor in the Department of Neurobiology, Physiology, and Behavior, is a newly elected Fellow of the American Association…