- Author: Kathy Keatley Garvey
Okay, where are they?
Shouldn't they be emerging soon?
They're in Davis and Suisun. Why not Vacaville?
We've been waiting--not so patiently after this long winter--for the reappearance of the showy Gulf Fritillary butterfly (Agraulis vanillae) on our passionflower vine (Passiflora).
On Saturday, March 26 (Easter weekend), a solo female fluttered into our yard and headed straight for the Passiflora. Not only did she reward us with our presence, but she laid several eggs, singly, on the leaves and tendrils. They're the size of a pinhead and look like pure gold. That's because they are.
Spring is a time of renewal, rejuvenation and rejoicing.
Butterfly guru Art Shapiro, distinguished professor of evolution and ecology at UC Davis who has monitored butterfly populations in Central California for more than four decades, saw his first Gulf Frit of the year on March 16 in Suisun. Read what he says about these brightly colored orange butterflies on his website.
Butterfly expert Greg Kareofelas, an associate at the Bohart Museum of Entomology, UC Davis, rescued a Gulf Frit larva from his Davis yard last winter and on March 17 watched the adult eclose from its chrysalis. Lately he's been on Butterfly Alert. He's spotted a number of Gulf Frits in his yard, including a female on March 26. His count includes other species as well, including a monarch and Western tiger swallowtails.
No monarch sightings for us yet, but one mourning cloak, two Western tiger swallowtails and two pipevine swallowtails.
Saturday's appearance of Mrs. Gulf Frit, however, was special. It was a day before Easter. Instead of a visit from the Easter Bunny delivering hen eggs, this was a visit from a Gulf Fritillary who graced us with several bonafide eggs. Her own.
- Author: Kathy Keatley Garvey
That's the theme of the Bohart Museum of Entomology open house from 1 to 4 p.m. on Saturday, Dec. 5 in Room 1124 of the Academic Surge Building on Crocker Lane, University of California, Davis.
In addition to the many exciting activities planned that day--it's free and open to the public--you can visit the museum's gift shop and find something “buggy” for holiday season for you or your family and friends. The gift shop is also open during the museum's regular hours, from 9 to noon and 1 to 5 p.m., Mondays through Thursdays.
Want a monarch butterfly t-shirt? Check.
Want some dragonfly earrings? Check.
Want some stocking stuffers, such as see-through lollipops with tasty crickets inside? Check.
Want an insect net for the budding entomologist in your family? Check.
Want some books on bees and bumblebees or a children's book on California's state insect, the dogface butterfly or a children's book on a butterfly found in the Amazon forest? Check.
Here are some of the items available at the Bohart Museum:
- Earrings and necklaces (with motifs of bees, dragonflies, moths, butterflies and other insects)
- T--shirts for babies, children and adults (walking sticks, monarch butterflies, beetles, dragonflies, dogface butterflies and the museum logo)
- Insect candy (lollipops with either crickets and scorpions, and chocolate-covered scorpions)
- Insect-themed food, Chapul bars made with cricket flour, and flavored mealworms and crickets
- Insect collecting equipment: bug carriers, nets, pins, boxes, collecting kits
- Plastic insect toys and stuffed animals (mosquito, praying mantis, bed bug and others)
- Handmade redwood insect storage boxes by Bohart Museum associate Jeff Smith
- Posters (Central Valley butterflies, dragonflies of California, dogface butterfly), prints of selected museum specimens
- Books by museum-associated authors:
- The Story of the Dogface Butterfly (Fran Keller, Greg Kareofelas and Laine Bauer), Insects and Gardens Insects and Gardens: In Pursuit of a Garden Ecology (Eric Grissell), Bumble Bees of North America: An Identification Guide (co-authored by Robbin Thorp), California Bees and Blooms: A Guide for Gardeners and Naturalists (co-authored by Robbin Thorp), Guide to Butterflies of the San Francisco Bay and the Sacramento Region (Art Shapiro), Butterfly Wish (Steve Stoddard, pen name S.S. Dudley), and multiple dragonfly books by Kathy Biggs.
- Notecards of bees and other pollinators by yours truly and Mary Foley Benson's wasp and caterpillar art
- Bohart logos (youth t-shirts, stickers and patches
- Used books
- Gift memberships
- Naming of insect species in the biolegacy program
All proceeds go for a good cause--funding the operation of the Bohart Museum. Directed by Lynn Kimsey, professor of entomology at UC Davis, it houses nearly eight million insect specimens from throughout the world. Another popular attraction is the live "petting" zoo where you can hold and photograph Madagascar hissing cockroaches, walking sticks and a rose-haired tarantula named "Peaches."
Keep calm and insect on!
- Author: Kathy Keatley Garvey
Dragonflies are fierce predators but they are predator-shy.
"If it looks like a duck, swims like a duck, and quacks like a duck, then it probably is a duck," as the saying goes. If you look like a predator, walk or fly like a predator and act like a predator, that dragonfly perched near you will take off.
The other day a variegated meadowhawk dragonfly, landed on a bamboo stake in our yard. It was identified as a "mature female Sympetrum corruptum" by dragonfly expert Rosser Garrison, a senior insect biosystematist in the California Department of Food and Agriculture's Plant Pest Diagnostics Branch, Sacramento, and by naturalist Greg Kareofelas, an associate at the Bohart Museum of Entomology, University of California, Davis.
How do you "catch" a dragonfly, that is, get close enough to photograph it? It helps to have a professional camera, fast shutter and a long lens, like a 200mm. Sometimes you can photograph them with a 105mm lens. To get this photo, I pretended to be part of a butterfly bush. I left my tripod behind and edged slowly, closer and closer, camera poised at the ready (a sudden movement and the dragonfly will be in the next zip code), focused, and clicked. A stiff breeze draped her wings over her head as if she were playing hide 'n seek.
Oftentimes, I'll sit in a chair and wait for them to return to the perch. They often do.
You can also drop to the ground (make yourself look little and uninterested.)
"Just as the sun was setting last night, I noticed many dragonflies flying in my backyard," Kareofelas said. "They were flying very quickly and very high, but every so often one would swoop down and land. When they do, you can approach slowly and get close. When you approach a perched dragonfly, slowly stoop as you get closer. Many times, if you do not appear larger as you get closer, the dragonfly does not realize you are getting close."
Good advice.
The variegated meadowhawk is one of the dragonflies on a Bohart Museum of Entomology poster, the work of entomologist Fran Keller and Kareofelas.
Its habitat ranges from throughout much of the United States to British Columbia and Canada. It's found as far south as Honduras, and as far west as eastern Asia.
It hangs around ponds, lakes and swamps to catch its prey. if you don't look, move or act like prey, you, too, can "catch" a dragonfly.
With your camera...
- Author: Kathy Keatley Garvey
They're an ancient insect. Their ancestors existed before dinosaurs. Indeed, fossil records show that they were the world's largest flying insects, some with wingspans measuring three feet.
Visitors at the Bohart Museum of Entomology open house last Sunday, Sept. 20 at the University of California, Davis, learned those facts--and more--when dragonfly expert Rosser Garrison of the California Department of Food and Agriculture (CDFA) showcased his work.
Garrison, senior insect biosystematist in the CDFA's Plant Pest Diagnostics Branch, Sacramento, showed part of his worldwide collection of dragonflies and answered questions from the eager guests. He has researched and collected dragonflies throughout much of the world, including Puerto Rico, Argentina and Costa Rica.
Of the world's 6000 described species of dragonflies, Garrison has collected representatives of some 3500 different species. His collection totals 45,000 specimens.
Garrison displayed “The largest dragonfly in the world," Petalura ingentissima. This magnificent species, he said, was discovered in 1908 in North Queensland, Australia. Specimens are not often seen in collections. Among his other specimens: some of the smallest dragonflies including Nannothemis bella, Perithemis tenera (both eastern United States) and Nannophya phymaea (Singapore).
Some interesting facts about dragonflies:
- Dragonfly relatives existed before the onset of the dinosaurs---Triassic Period, 250 to 200 million years ago
- They have a primitive flight mechanism compared to other insects, bees, butterflies, beetles and flies.
- Dragonflies mostly mate on the wing.
- They are not poisonous and they do not sew up people's ears (“devil's darning needles”). However, one group of large dragonflies are called—appropriately—"Darners."
- Larvae have a prehensile foldable lower lip unique in insects; it is used for capturing prey like mosquito larvae or even small fish.
Garrison's research has resulted in more than 80 published papers and book chapters. He served as the senior author of two recently published volumes, Dragonfly Genera of the New World. An Illustrated and Annotated Key to the Anisoptera (2006), and Damselfly Genera of the New World. An Illustrated and Annotated Key to the Zygoptera (2010), both published by The Johns Hopkins University Press). He has also contributed chapters on invertebrate ecology for The Food Web of a Tropical Rain Forest (Chicago University Press, 1996) and Manu. The Biodiversity of Southeastern Peru (National Museum of Natural History, 1996). Since January 1998, he has edited Odonatologica, the quarterly journal of the Societas Internationalis Odonatologica.
Garrison holds two degrees from the University of California, Berkeley: his master's degree in 1974 and his doctorate in 1979. His doctoral dissertation explored “Population Dynamics and Systematics of the Damselfly genus Enallagma of the western United States (Odonata: Coenagionidae) 1979," published in 1984.
Among those attending were several other dragonfly experts/enthusiasts:
- Andrew Rehn, a stream ecologist with the California Department of Fish and Wildlife, who received his doctorate in entomology (dissertation on dragonflies) at UC Davis in 2000 with major professor Lynn Kimsey, director of the Bohart Museum and professor of entomology at UC Davis
- Kathy Claypole Biggs of Sebastopol and McCloud, author of Dragonflies of California and Dragonflies of the Greater Southwest and a children's coloring book on dragonflies
- Sandra Hunt-von Arb, senior biologist at the Pacific Northwestern Biological Resources, McKinleyville, Calif (she started Western Odonata on Facebook on Feb. 8 and leads dragonfly workshops in Northern California; and
- Greg Kareofelas, Bohart Museum associate who is a naturalist and photographer who studies dragonflies, butterflies and other insects. He and Fran Keller (doctorate in entomology from UC Davis) created the dragonfly and butterfly posters available for sale at the Bohart.
The dragonfly open house was the first of the academic year. Other weekend open houses scheduled:
Saturday, Dec. 5, 1 to 4 p.m.: “Keep Calm and Insect On.”
Sunday, Jan. 10 from 1 to 4 p.m.: “Parasitoid Palooza II”
Saturday, Feb. 13: Biodiversity Museum Day
Saturday, April 16, 10 a.m. to 3 p.m.: UC Davis Picnic Day
Saturday, July 31, 8 to 11 p.m.: “Celebrate Moths.”
The Bohart Museum, located in Room 1134 of the Academic Surge Building on Crocker Lane, houses a global collection of nearly eight million specimens, including 469 different species of dragonflies. It is also the home of the seventh largest insect collection in North America, and the California Insect Survey, a storehouse of the insect biodiversity. Noted entomologist Richard M. Bohart (1913-2007) founded the museum. It is open to the public Monday through Thursday, from 9 a.m. to noon and from 1 to 5 p.m.
More information on the Bohart Museum is available by contacting (530) 752-0493 or emailing bmuseum@ucdavis.edu. Tabatha Yang (tabyang@ucdavis.edu) is the public education and outreach coordinator.
- Author: Kathy Keatley Garvey
Oh, what a (moth) night!
Saturday, July 18 marked the beginning of National Moth Week and the Bohart Museum of Entomology obliged with an indoor and outdoor open house, its first-ever evening open house.
The event took place from 8 to 11 p.m. The crowd marveled at the moth specimens inside the museum, and then stepped outside to check the moths flying into blacklighting and mercury vapor setup.
Like a moth to a flame...
"We saw some familiar faces, but many new ones," said Tabatha Yang, public education and outreach coordinator for the Bohart Museum, home of nearly eight million insect specimens.
It was "getaway weekend" for a mother-daughter team. They booked room reservations a Davis hotel, and did some shopping. Then it was Moth Night. "The daughter, a high school sophomore, came here for the 4-H Field Day this spring," Yang noted. Keenly interested in entomology, the teenager decided the Bohart open house "was a good reason for her to come back."
Another teenage visitor was in a Tech Trek (a STEM outreach event for junior high girls) and brought her family to the open house.
Highlights of Moth Night included:
- Entomologist and Bohart associate Jeff Smith of Rocklin demonstrating Lepitodera preparation using material that entomologist Fran Keller recently brought back from Belize.
- "Moth Man" John DeBenedictis of Davis and Bohart senior museum scientist Steve Heydon showing the crowd the moths flying into the blacklighting and mercury vapor lighting setup.
- Bohart associate Greg Kareofelas of Davis guiding guests through the moth collection
Also helping were volunteers Maia Lundy, Fran Keller, Wade Spencer, Laura Morgan, Alex Nguyen, Melissa Cruz, Joel Hernandez, James Heydon, Anita Pratap, and Maria Nansen with daughters Miriam, 15, Emma, 12, and Molly, 6. Their father is a UC Davis entomologist. The sisters helped the visitors create buttons.
The event wrapped up "the very successful 10 weekend events we hosted this past academic year," Yang noted. "Stay tuned for the 2015-2016 Bohart 0pen Huse schedule to be announced later in August."
The museum is directed by Lynn Kimsey, professor of entomology, UC Davis Department of Entomology and Nematology.