These days, most people are wearing masks when out in public for personal protection for themselves or others. In nature, there are a few pests that have their own type of face coverings, markings, or that other types of protective covers or behavior.

Below are a few such pests that you might be encountering now in your gardens and landscapes.

Masked Pests

Masked chafers are golden brown beetles with dark heads that give them their name. The adults are not typically considered pests although they do show up on window screens, in pools, or wander into the home. The immatures, white C-shaped grubs, are considers pests because they feed...

At some point, all of us encounter a pest in our home, garden, or landscape. But you're not alone! UC IPM publishes Pest Notes – a series of more than 150 papers reviewed by experts in the field – to provide science-based information about pests and their management.

These ten Pest Notes were the most frequently viewed online in 2019, with more than 330,000 total pageviews. While it's not a contest, we like to think these are the winners of 2019's most popular pests.

1. Aphids

These small, soft-bodied insects can multiply rapidly, especially in warm weather. Many species exist in...

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1. Ants

Most people deal with ants around their home at some point. Because most ants live outdoors, focus efforts on keeping ants from entering buildings by caulking entryways. Follow good sanitation practices to make your home less attractive to ants. Spraying ants inside the home will not prevent more ants from entering. Use baits to control the ant colony. Pesticide baits work by attracting worker ants who then take the poison back to the nest where the entire colony, including queens, can be killed. In the landscape, ants protect...

People sometimes don't recognize scales as insects, but understanding scale types and signs of their presence will enable you to best manage them if encountered on your plants.

Scale insects are circular, elongate, or oval insects that often resemble discolored or raised areas on bark, leaves, or fruit. Scales are small and mostly immobile and damage many types of trees and shrubs by sucking out plant juices with their tiny, strawlike mouthparts. Infestations can cause yellowing or premature dropping of leaves, sticky honeydew, and blackish sooty mold. Plant parts can distort or die back, depending on the species and abundance of scales.

Although most plants...