Noted entomologist Steve Sheppard of Washington State University will keynote the UC Davis Bee Symposium. (Photo courtesy of Washington State University)

Registration for the third annual UC Davis Bee Symposium, "Keeping Bees Healthy," set Sunday, May 7 in the UC Davis Conference Center, gets underway on Wednesday, March 1.

The all-day event is designed for beekeepers of all experience levels, including gardeners, farmers and anyone interested in the world of pollination and bees.

The symposium is sponsored by the UC Davis Honey and Pollination Center and the UC Davis Department of Entomology and Nematology.

Keynote speaker is Steve Sheppard, Thurber Professor of Apiculture and chair of the Department of Entomology, Washington State University, Pullman, Wash.

Sheppard specializes in population genetics and evolution of honey bees, insect introductions & mechanisms of genetic differentiation. He also heads the Apis Molecular Systematics Laboratory.

Sheppard received his bachelor's degree in zoology from the University of Georgia in 1975, and both of his graduate degrees in entomology from the University of Illinois: his master's degree in 1979 and his doctorate in 1986.  He worked as a postdoctoral fellow at the USDA Beneficial Insects Laboratory from 1986 to 1988, and as a research entomologist at the USDA Bee Research Laboratory from 1988 to 1996 before joining the WSU faculty in 1996. He was named chair of the department in 2009.

The event will include speakers, displays of graduate student research posters, the latest in beekeeping equipment, books, honey, plants, "and much more," according to Amina Harris, director of the UC Davis Honey and Pollination Center.

Among the other speakers:

• Santiago Ramirez of the UC Davis Department of Evolution and Ecology;
• Extension apiculturist Elina Niño of the UC Davis Department of Entomology and Nematology;
• Maj Rundlöf of the Department of Biology, Lund University, Sweden, and
• Margaret Lombard, National Honey Board, based in Firestone, Colo.

To register, access http://honey.ucdavis.edu/events/2017-bee-symposium.