- Author: Kathy Keatley Garvey
That's what Katja Poveda, assistant professor of entomology, Cornell University, Ithaca, N.Y., does.
Poveda is interested in "understanding these interactions at many different levels (from the plant to the landscape) to seek for more sustainable strategies to increase ecosystems services provided by insects such as pollination and natural enemies and to decrease dis-services mediated by herbivores to ultimately increase yield."
The Cornell entomologist will be at UC Davis on Wednesday, April 4 to discuss "Landscape Complexity Effects on Yield: The Importance of Arthropod-Mediated Ecosystem Services." She'll present a UC Davis Department of Entomology and Nematology seminar at 4:10 p.m., Wednesday, April 4. in 122 Briggs Hall, located off Kleiber Hall Drive.
"In my seminar, I will be talking about the Guatemalan tuber moth (Tecia solanivora); a variety of native pollinators that visit strawberry in upstate New York; and pests of cabbage such as flea beetles, the imported cabbageworm (Pieris rapae) and Trichoplusia ni," she says.
A Cornell Chronicle news release, spotlighting Poveda and colleagues, indicates that potato plants boost the chemical defenses in their leaves when the Guatemalan tuber moth larvae feed on their tubers. The potato's response protects against leaf-eating pests, ensuring the plant can maintain sugar production to continue growing tubers during the moth larvae infestation. The research, published in the journal Oecologia, may lead to reducing potato damage from insect pests and increase tuber yields.
The Guatelmalan tuber moth is not in the United States, but it is spreading and is difficult to control, the scientists noted.
Poveda has co-authored such publications as "Landscape Simplification Decreases Wild Bee Pollination Services to Strawberry" (Journal of Agriculture, Ecosystems and Environment); "Predicting Bee Community Responses to Land-Use Changs: Effects of Geographic and Taxonomic Biases" (Scientific Reports); "Can Overcompensation Increase Crop Production” (Ecology), “Landscape Simplification Reduces Classical Biological Control and Crop Yield” (Ecological Applications); “Leaf Herbivory Imposes Fitness Costs Mediated by Hummingbied and Insect Pollinators” (PloS One) and “Costs and Tradeoffs of Resistance and Tolerance to Belowground Herbivory in Potato” (PloS One). See more on Google Scholar.
Poveda's seminar is the first in a series of departmental seminars for the spring quarter. Coordinators are assistant professor Rachel Vannette, and Ph.D candidate Brendon Boudinot of the Phil Ward lab.
- Author: Kathy Keatley Garvey
And the winner is…drumroll…Art Shapiro. Yes, he's won again!
We're not sure how many folks were out searching in the three-county area of Sacramento, Solano and Yolo, but the first butterfly of the year is now history.
Shapiro collected the cabbage white butterfly, Pieris rapae, at 11:23 a.m. Friday, Jan. 19 in one of his frequented sites—a mustard patch by railroad tracks in West Sacramento, Yolo County. He caught it with his hands--no net--no small feat.
Since 1972, the first flight has varied from Jan. 1 to Feb. 22, averaging about Jan. 20. Shapiro acknowledged that he didn't think he'd find it Jan. 19 as the weather forecast included cloudy skies and a chance of rain.
“I spotted the male butterfly dorsal basking (sunbathing) on low vegetation shortly after the first cumulous formed at 11 a.m.,” the professor said. “As I approached to collect it, a small cumulus occluded the sun and it closed its wings over its back--allowing me to just pick it up without using my net at all, and drop it into a glassine envelope. It turned out that that was the ONLY cloud that crossed the sun in the next two and a half hours! It got up to about 60 degrees and was a gorgeous day with a trace of a west wind.”
He described the butterfly as quite yellow instead of white. “Cold weather promotes sepiapterin formation, so early ones are often quite yellow.”
Apparently the newly emerged butterfly had not yet flown. When Shapiro placed it in the glassine envelope, “it voided meconium, metabolic wastes of metamorphosis, normally ejected before the first flight.” (Note that in its immature form, the cabbageworm is a pest. See UC Statewide Integrated Pest Management Program (UC IPM) website.)
His former graduate student, Matt Forester, now a professor of biology at the University of Nevada, Reno, and a research collaborator with Shapiro, accurately predicted the first butterfly would be found on Jan. 19.
This is the seventh year the winning butterfly has been collected in Yolo County. Last year Shapiro found the winner on the UC Davis campus; in 2016, graduate student Jacob Montgomery netted the winner outside his home in west Davis, and Shapiro collected all five winners from 2012 to 2015 in West Sacramento.
Shapiro mused that the 2018 winner "probably emerged an hour or so before I got there so this really is the start of the season! Let the rites of spring begin!”
How many days 'til spring? Check out this handy "Days Left to Spring" website for the days, hours and minutes.
/span>- Author: Kathy Keatley Garvey
If you've been looking for that cabbage white butterfly in the three-area county of Sacramento, Yolo and Solano to win UC Davis Professor Art Shapiro's "Beer for a Butterfly" contest, there's still hope.
Shapiro hasn't found it, either.
Butterflies aren't flying due to the elements: the rain, the cold and the fog.
Shapiro, distinguished professor of evolution and ecology launched the "Beer for a Butterfly" contest back in 1972 as part of his scientific research. If you collect the first cabbage white butterfly (Pieris rapae) of the year, you can trade "the bug for suds."
Shapiro is offering a pitcher of beer (or its equivalent) for the first cabbage white butterfly collected in 2018 in any one of the three counties. “Since 1972, the first flight has varied from Jan. 1 to Feb. 22, averaging about Jan. 20,” he says.
The butterfly inhabits vacant lots, fields and gardens where its host plants, weedy mustards, grow. What does it look like? It's a white butterfly with black dots on the upperside (which may be faint or not visible in the early season). It inhabits vacant lots, fields and gardens where its host plants, weedy mustards, grow. The male is white. The female is often slightly buffy; the "underside of the hindwing and apex of the forewing may be distinctly yellow and normally have a gray cast,” Shapiro said. “The black dots and apical spot on the upperside tend to be faint or even to disappear really early in the season.”
In its caterpillar stage, Pieris rapae is a pest. (See cabbageworm on the UC Statewide Integrated Pest Management Program website.)
Meanwhile, the contest rules include:
- It must be an adult (no caterpillars or pupae) and be captured outdoors.
- It must be brought in alive to the department office, 2320 Storer Hall, UC Davis, during work hours, 8 a.m. to 5 p.m., Monday through Friday, with the full data (exact time, date and location of the capture) and your name, address, phone number and/or e-mail. The receptionist will certify that it is alive and refrigerate it. (If you collect it on a weekend or holiday, keep it in a refrigerator; do not freeze. A few days in the fridge will not harm it.)
- Shapiro is the sole judge.
Shapiro, who is in the field more than 200 days of the year, monitoring butterflies of central California (see his website), knows where to find the cabbage whites and usually wins the contest. He has been defeated only four times since 1972--and all by UC Davis graduate students.
The professor collects many of the winners in mustard patches near railroad tracks in West Sacramento, Yolo County. Over the last eight years, five came from West Sacramento; two in Davis, Yolo County; and one in Suisun, Solano County.
The dates and locations:
- 2017: Jan. 19: Art Shapiro collected the winner on the UC Davis campus
- 2016: Jan. 16: Jacob Montgomery, UC Davis graduate student, collected the winner in west Davis
- 2015: Jan. 26: Shapiro collected the winner in West Sacramento
- 2014: Jan. 14: Shapiro collected the winner in West Sacramento
- 2013: Jan. 21: Shapiro collected the winner in West Sacramento
- 2012: Jan. 8: Shapiro collected the winner in West Sacramento
- 2011: Jan. 31: Shapiro collected the winner in Suisun, Solano County
- 2010: Jan. 27: Shapiro collected the winner in West Sacramento
The search continues!
- Author: Kathy Keatley Garvey
The annual “Butterfly for a Beer” contest, sponsored by Art Shapiro, distinguished professor of evolution and ecology at the University of California, Davis, gets underway on Monday, Jan. 1.
The person who collects the first cabbage white butterfly (Pieris rapae) of the year in one of three counties—Sacramento, Yolo and Solano—will receive a pitcher of beer or its equivalent. The butterfly must be collected outdoors and delivered live to the Department of Evolution and Ecology, Room 2320 of Storer Hall.
"Since 1972, the first flight of the cabbage white butterfly has varied from Jan. 1 to Feb. 22, averaging about Jan. 20," said Shapiro, who researches biological responses to climate change--and has won all the contests but four.
He predicts that the first butterfly of 2018 may be collected as soon as Jan. 5 or 6, “depending on the weather.”
The professor launched the contest in 1972 as part of his long-term studies of butterfly life cycles and climate change. Pieris rapae is emerging earlier and earlier as the regional climate has warmed, said Shapiro. "The cabbage white is now emerging a week or so earlier on average than it did 30 years ago here."
Shapiro netted the first cabbage white butterfly of 2017 at 1:56 p.m., Thursday, Jan. 19 in the student gardens near the Solano Park Apartments. “This was the second year in a row that the first rapae was found in a garden rather than one of the conventional ‘warm pockets,' Shapiro noted. The 2016 winner? UC Davis ecology graduate student Jacob Montgomery collected it in his garden in West Davis on Jan. 16.
The contest rules include:
- It must be an adult (no caterpillars or pupae) and be captured outdoors.
- It must be brought in alive to the department office, 2320 Storer Hall, UC Davis, during work hours, 8 a.m. to 5 p.m., Monday through Friday, with the full data (exact time, date and location of the capture) and the contact information of the collector (address, phone number and/or e-mail.) The receptionist will certify that it is alive and refrigerate it. (If it's collected on a weekend or holiday, it can be kept in the refrigerator for a few days--do not freeze it.)
- Shapiro is the sole judge.
The professor, a fellow of the American Association for the Advancement of Science, the Royal Entomological Society and the California Academy of Sciences, said Pieris rapae inhabits vacant lots, fields and gardens where its host plants, weedy mustards, grow. The male is white. The female is often slightly buffy; the "underside of the hindwing and apex of the forewing may be distinctly yellow and normally have a gray cast,” Shapiro said. “The black dots and apical spot on the upperside tend to be faint or even to disappear really early in the season.”
As a caterpillar, the insect is a pest of cole crops such as cabbage. UC Statewide Integrated Pest Management Program (UC IPM) says the cabbageworm is active throughout the year in California. "Cabbageworm larvae chew large, irregular holes in leaves, bore into heads, and drop greenish brown fecal pellets that may contaminate the marketed product. Seedlings may be damaged, but most losses are due to damage to marketed parts of the plant," according to the UC IPM website.
Shapiro, who is in the field for more than 200 days of the year, monitoring butterflies, maintains a research website on butterflies, where he records the population trends. He is the author of A Field Guide to Butterflies of the San Francisco Bay and Sacramento Valley Regions, illustrated by Tim Manolis and published in 2007 by the University of California Press.
Shapiro's four defeats came from UC Davis graduate students: Adam Porter won in 1983; Sherri Graves and Rick VanBuskirk each won in the late 1990s; and Jacob Montgomery in 2016. The first three were his own graduate students.
The professor collects many of the winners in mustard patches near railroad tracks in West Sacramento, Yolo County. Over the last eight years, five came from West Sacramento; two in Davis, Yolo County; and one in Suisun, Solano County.
The dates and locations:
- 2017: Jan. 19: Art Shapiro collected the winner on the UC Davis campus
- 2016: Jan. 16: Jacob Montgomery collected the winner in west Davis
- 2015: Jan. 26: Shapiro collected the winner in West Sacramento
- 2014: Jan. 14: Shapiro collected the winner in West Sacramento
- 2013: Jan. 21: Shapiro collected the winner in West Sacramento
- 2012: Jan. 8: Shapiro collected the winner in West Sacramento
- 2011: Jan. 31: Shapiro collected the winner in Suisun, Solano County
- 2010: Jan. 27: Shapiro collected the winner in West Sacramento
Coincidentally, Shapiro caught the 2013 and 2009 winners on President Obama's Inauguration Day. This year he missed President Trump's Inauguration Day by a day.
- Author: Kathy Keatley Garvey
Mark your calendar!
Here's an opportunity--especially for new students and prospective students at the University of California, Davis and their families--to learn about insects.
While students are moving into the dorms on Sunday, Sept. 24, an open house, themed "Insects and U," will take place at the Bohart Museum of Entomology from 1 to 4 p.m. in Room 1124 of the Academic Surge Building on Crocker Lane.
The open house, a family friendly event, is free and open to the public of all ages.
"This purposely coincides with UC Davis dorm move-in weekend," says Tabatha Yang, education and outreach coordinator. "Our target audience is new students and their families, but everyone is welcome. The focus is how to study insects at home and in school--any age."
Undergraduate advisor Brandy Fleming will be on hand (tabling) to talk about classes, careers, and fun with entomology.
Yang is also planning a display featuring cabbage white butterflies for educators.
The Bohart Museum, directed by Lynn Kimsey, UC Davis professor of entomology, is a world-renowned insect museum that houses a global collection of nearly eight million specimens. It also maintains a live “petting zoo,” featuring walking sticks, Madagascar hissing cockroaches, walking sticks, praying mantids, and tarantulas. A gift shop, open year around, offers T-shirts, sweatshirts, books, jewelry, posters, insect-collecting equipment and insect-themed candy.
The Bohart Museum's regular hours are from 9 a.m. to noon and 1 to 5 p.m. Mondays through Thursdays. The museum is closed to the public on Fridays, Saturdays and Sundays and on major holidays. Admission is free.
For more information, contact the bmuseum@ucdavis.edu or access the website or Facebook page.