This year, National Pollinator Week is June 22 to June 28, celebrating the value that pollinators such as bees, birds, butterflies, bats, and beetles provide to the ecosystem.

Pollinators, and natural enemies, can be harmed by pesticides when people are trying to control pests in their gardens and landscapes. Pollinators can be killed or harmed if they are sprayed or exposed directly to a pesticide, and when they encounter pesticide residues in the environment. You can protect pollinators in your garden and landscapes by doing the following:

• Use pesticides sparingly. Many pests can be managed using an integrated approach without the need to...

While we are staying home during the pandemic, insects are most definitely not! 

In fact, you may have seen different types of insects swarming over the last few weeks. Swarming is a reproductive behavior where certain insects leave their colonies in droves, mate, disperse, and establish new colonies. Most of these swarms are not successful and end up dying, but for those that are successful, spring is an optimal time for insect colonies to find new homes. 

Honey bees are one type of insect that can swarm at this time of the year while looking for new nesting locations. A large number of bees may appear frightening, but most spring swarms of the European honey bee are very docile and unlikely to sting. Our

It's not often that we get to mix baseball and pests in our blog, but today we learned that the San Francisco Giants and Cincinnati Reds game was delayed by almost 20 minutes due to swarming bees.

You can read different takes on this story from the Washington Post, NBC News, and on the Major League Baseball website, and see as one Reds player pretended to spray a pesticide to kill the bees.

In a practical...

In observance of National Pollinator Week, we thought we'd share how you can manage pests around your home, garden, and landscape and still protect pollinators.

Natural enemies (predators, parasites, and pathogens) reduce pest populations and help prevent damage to plants. Pollinators such as domesticated honey bees, wild bees, and other pollinating insects, are essential in the production of many of the fruits, vegetables, and nuts we grow in California, both in our backyards and in commercial agriculture.

Natural enemies and pollinators can be harmed by pesticides...