UC Davis distinguished professor emerita Lynn Kimsey, director of the Bohart Museum of Entomology for 34 years until her retirement on Feb. 1, 2024, is among the 17 emeriti featured in a newly released video tribute to emeriti, an annual public service project by UC Davis distinguished professor Walter Leal.

The 17 featured represent about 20 percent of UC Davis faculty who retired in 2023-24.

Kimsey is a recognized authority on insect biodiversity, systematics and biogeography of parasitic wasps, urban entomology, civil forensic entomology, and arthropod-related industrial hygiene. A UC Davis entomology alumna, she received her undergraduate degree in 1975 and her doctorate in 1979. 

Kimsey joined the entomology faculty in 1989 and became the Bohart Museum director in 1990. Although officially retired, she continues her research and as executive director of the Bohart Museum Society. She writes and publishes the quarterly newsletter.

In the video, Leal notes that Kimsey "is an entomologist interested in the systematics of stinging wasps, insect biotic diversity, and urban entomology...she provided insect diagnostics for the public and corporations, non-profit organizations,  and governmental agencies."

"Her research focused primarily on cuckoo wasps, hornets, and tiphiid wasps, describing more than 30 new genera and 300 new species of wasps. Her fieldwork included biotic surveys of the insect fauna of various desert sand dune systems in California and tropical habitats in Central America and Southeast Asia."

Kimsey served as president of the International Society of Hymenopterists from 2002-2004, and as a member of the board of directors of the Natural Science Collections Alliance in 2000 and 2001. The Pacific Branch, Entomological Society of America (PBESA) singled her out for its highest honor, the C. W. Woodworth Award, in 2020. She received the PBESA Systematics, Evolution, and Biodiversity Award in 2014 and was a member of "The Bee Team" that won the PBESA Outstanding Team Award in 2013. The UC Davis Academic Senate honored her with its Distinguished Scholarly Public Service Award in 2016 in recognition of her outstanding work. And in 2023, CA&ES selected her as the recipient of its Exceptional Faculty Award.  She was honored with a 21-insect net salute in April.

In addition to the faculty highlights, Leal included brief messages by Chancellor Gary May, Provost Mary Croughan, and Suad Joseph, the UC Davis Emeriti Association (UCDEA) president. UCDEA interviews and records emeriti who have made "significant contributions to the development of the university." See Video Records Project.

"I know our emeriti are feeling the energy at UC Davis as we prepare to greet our incoming class of students," said Chancellor May in the video transcript. "I want to extend a welcome to all our emeriti professors and encourage you to remain involved in our vibrant campus activity just as you've been such an important part of our success." 

Those featured on the video tribute, in order of appearance: 

• Stuart Meyers,  professor emeritus, Department of Anatomy, Physiology, and Cell Biology, School of Veterinary Medicine 
• Peter Mundy, emeritus distinguished professor, Department of Education, and the Department of Psychiatry, College of Letters and Science
• Vaidehi Ramanathan, professor emerita, Department of Linguistics, College of Letters and Science
• Scott Simon, distinguished professor emeritus, Department of Biomedical Engineering, College of Engineering
• Bruce German, distinguished professor emeritus, Department of Food Science and Technology, College of Agricultural and Environmental Sciences
• Lynn Kimsey, distinguished professor emerita, Department of Entomology and Nematology, College of Agricultural and Environmental Sciences
• Leonard Abbeduto, professor emeritus, Department of Psychiatry and Behavioral Sciences, School of Medicine
• Lynette Hart, professor emerita, Department of Population Health and Reproduction, School of Veterinary Medicine
• Frank Sharp, distinguished professor emeritus, Department of Neurology, School of Medicine
• Stephen Wheeler, professor emeritus, Urban Design and Sustainability, Department of Human Ecology, College of Agricultural and Environmental Sciences
• Esther Kim, professor emerita, Eye Center, School of Medicine
• Julia Menard-Warwick, professor emerita, Department of Linguistics, College of Letters and Science
• Mohamed Hafez, professor emeritus, Department of Mechanical and Aerospace Engineering, College of Engineering
• Geoffrey Schladow, professor emeritus, Department of Civil and Environmental Engineering, College of Engineering
• Gail Taylor, distinguished professor emerita, Department of Plant Sciences, College of Agricultural and Environmental Sciences
• Paul FitzGerald, distinguished professor emeritus, Department of Cell Biology and Human Anatomy and Department of Ophthalmology and Vision Science, School of Medicine
• Alan Balch, distinguished professor emeritus, Department of Chemistry, College of Letters and Science

Additionally, Leal spotlighted (1) an emeriti “caught on camera” (Geerat J. Vermeij) heading to work two years after his retirement ("to stress how many members of the Emeriti remain engaged in UC Davis affairs"), and (2) UC Davis faculty member (Alan Balch) who broke the record on the number of years of service to the University of California (56 years, which included 52 at UC Davis).

Leal creates an annual tribute to UC Davis emeriti as a public service to celebrate their accomplishments as they enter a new chapter in their lives. It is a zero-budget, one-person production.

Leal launched his first "Tribute to Our New Emeriti," featuring 24 professors from eight colleges and schools who transitioned to emeriti in 2021-2022. (See news story.) The 2022-23 tribute is here. (See news story)

Leal, a member of the Department of Molecular and Cellular Biology faculty since 2013, is a former professor and chair of the Department of Entomology. He is the first UC Davis faculty member to win all three of the Academic Senate's most coveted awards: in research, teaching, and public service.  Leal received the 2020 Distinguished Teaching Award for Undergraduate Teaching; the 2022 Distinguished Scholarly Public Service Award; and the 2024 Distinguished Faculty Research Award. 

"Silk is a natural protein fiber, some forms of which can be woven into textiles. The protein fiber of silk is composed mainly of fibroin and is produced by certain insect larvae to form cocoons.The best-known silk is obtained from the cocoons of the larvae of the mulberry silkworm Bombyx mori reared in captivity." --Wikipedia.

Those attending the Bohart Museum of Entomology's recent Moth Night learned all about silkworms, moths, cocoons and textiles at a display staffed by Michael "Mike" Pitcairn, a retired senior environmental scientist/supervisor with the California Department of Food and Agriculture.

Mulberry silk production originated in China at least 5000 years ago. Folklore indicates that the wife of a Chinese emperor watched a cocoon fall from a mulberry tree into her teacup. She reportedly watched the cocoon unravel, revealing a long delicate thread. She collected thousands of the threads and made a robe for the emperor.

Biology Professor Richard Peigler of University of the Incarnate Word, San Antonio, donated the items to the Bohart Museum in 2020,  said UC Davis Distinguished Professor Emerita Lynn Kimsey, former director of the Bohart. "What's cool about it is," she said, "is that the silk pieces were made from silk produced by multiple silk moth species, not just the one we think of commercially."

The mulberry moth is the primary producer of silk. Tussah is the most well known of the wild silks. 

Peigler has worked extensively with wild silk moths, studying their phylogeny, taxonomy and biology. His donations comprise the Wild Silks collection at the McGuire Center for Lepidoptera and Biodiversity, Florida Museum of Natural History, University of Florida.

"Wild silk is not nearly as luxurious as domestic silk found in today's clothing industry," the McGuire Center website relates. "This is raw, rough, and textured silk which feels almost paper-like to the human touch. This silk is harvested from the cocoons of various silk moths that encounter little to no human interaction. The practice of producing silk – termed sericulture, stretches back 5 millennia, and astonishingly, is a craft performed to this very day."

The Bohart Museum displayed textiles from four silks: mulberry  (Bombyx mori), tussah (Antheraea pernyi), tassar (Antheraea paphia), and eri (Samia ricini).

They included a woman's chaddar (head covering and shawl) and tablecloths.

Eri Silk (Samia ricini). Displayed was a woman's chaddar of 100 percent eri silk (Samia ricini), handwoven in Assam, India, and of naturally colored yarn. The brocade was done in traditional Assamese motifs. Women in rural villages in Northeast India wear these traditional shawls in winter. Peigler bought the chaddar for $47 from a seller in India in 2019. 

Tussah Silk (Antheraea pernyi).  Displayed was an antique tablecloth of tussah silk, handwoven in China in the 1920s or 1930s. The tablecloth, hand-reeled and in the natural beige color,  is hand-embroidered with mulberry silk (Bombx mori). China has exported thousands of tablecloths and handkerchiefs made of tussah silk (called "pongee" or "Shantng silk") to the United States and the United Kingdom.  Peigler purchased this tablecloth in April 2019 from an internet seller in Mount Dora, Fla., for $35.

Also of interest was a sample of tussah silk fabric in a pattern called "Honeycomb," mimicking the hexagonal cells in a bee colony.  "The yarns were machine spun and the fabric was machine woven," said Peigler, who purchased the fabric from Oriental Silk Import Co. in Los Angeles for $32.95 per yard.  There are several species of tussah silk moths (family Saturniidae) in China, India, Japan, Africa and North America.

Mulberry Silk (Bombx mori). Displayed was a tablecloth created in the early 1900s in China.  "It was spun, woven and embroidered by hand," Peigler related. 

The Bohart Museum, founded in 1946, is located in Room 1124 of the Academic Surge Building, 455 Crocker Lane, UC Davis campus. It also includes a live petting zoo and an insect-themed gift shop. Director of the museum is Professor Jason Bond, the Evert and Marion Schlinger Endowed Chair of UC Davis Department of Entomology and Nematology, and associate dean, Agricultural Sciences, UC Davis College of Agricultural and Environmental Sciences.

The Bohart Museum is open to walk-in visitors on Tuesdays from 9 a.m. to noon and from 1 to 4:30 p.m. through Aug. 27. It will be closed to the public Sept. 1-22.  

The next open house is set for 1 to 4 p.m., Saturday, Sept. 28. The theme is "Museum ABC's: Arthropods, Bohart and Collecting." All open houses are free and family friendly. Parking is also free. For more information, contact bmuseum@ucdavis.edu or access the website at https://bohart.ucdavis.edu.

Busy as a bee? 

No, as industrious as a Lepidopterist. 

Specifically, as industrious and dedicated as Jeff Smith, curator of the moth and butterfly collection at the UC Davis Bohart Museum of Entomology--a collection that an international authority on Lepidoptera praised as “The Gold Standard” of Lep collections.

But more about that later.  

Smith, fascinated by insects since his childhood in San Jose,  considers entomology “my passion” and the Bohart Museum “my cause.” 

You may remember him from back in 2015, when he received a  highly competitive Friend of the College Award from the UC Davis College of Agricultural and Environmental Sciences.

Lynn Kimsey, then director of the Bohart Museum and a UC Davis professor of entomology (and now distinguished professor emerita) nominated Smith for the award. “You could not ask for a better friend than Jeff Smith,” she said, noting that he has “brought us international acclaim and saved us $160,000 through donations of specimens and materials, identification skills and his professional woodworking skills. This does not include the thousands of hours he has donated in outreach programs that draw attention to the museum, the college and the university.”

Kimsey, who directed the museum for 34 years, stepping down on Feb. 1, 2024 when Professor Jason Bond accepted the position, remembers when Smith joined the museum. “When Jeff was working for Univar Environmental Services, a 35-year career until his retirement in 2013, he would spend some of his vacation days at the museum. Over the years Jeff took over more and more of the curation of the butterfly and moth collection. He took home literally thousands of field pinned specimens and spread their wings at home, bringing them back to the museum perfectly mounted. To date he has spread the wings on more than 200,000 butterflies and moths. This translates into something like 33,000 hours of work!”

Kimsey praised Smith for completely reorganizing the butterfly and moth collection. “It's no small feat to rearrange this many specimens, housed in roughly one thousand drawers,” she said. “Many thousands of the specimens needed to be identified, and the taxonomy required extensive updating and reorganization.” (See news story)

We caught up with Smith the other day for an update.

A Bohart volunteer since 1998, Smith has donated some 100,000 specimens (primarily butterflies, moths but a few other insects, including beetles) to the Bohart Museum. To date, he has spread the wings of some 180,000 moth and butterflies. He has crafted and donated some 2,475 wooden specimen drawers.  He is valued for his expertise and public outreach at the Bohart Museum's open houses, usually about nine in number. The open houses include UC Davis Picnic Day, UC Davis Biodiversity Museum Day, and Take-Your-Daughters-and-Sons-to-Work Day.

In addition, Smith annually presents an evening spreading class to the UC Davis Entomology Club as well as an annual presentation to Bio Boot Camp. He also speaks at 12 to 15 other venues per year, engaging students at School Science Days and in individual classrooms.

825,454 Specimens in Lep Collection. “We have 825,454 specimens of moths and butterflies,” he said, delighted to be showing the collection at the Bohart Museum's Moth Night from 7 to 11 on Saturday, July 20, in celebration of National Moth Week.  “We have around 618,750 moths, ranging in size from the huge Atlas moths (10-inch wingspan) to the extremely tiny (4 mm wingspan) leafminer moths.”  The event is free and family friendly. 

Colors of the moths "range from brown or gray ones with no particular markings to the extraordinary Sunset Moth from Madagascar, with its green, yellow, and violet colors," he said. "Some moths are perfect mimics of leaves or tree bark, some are brightly colored to advertise their unpalatable nature, while others mimic stinging wasps and bees for their protection. Some moths do not feed at all as the adult moth, while others may have a drinking tube (their proboscis) up to 12 inches long. A few exotic species use this proboscis to drink blood from mammals or the tears of sleeping people. Some moth species are important pollinators of various plants and trees while others, like the Gypsy Moth, are terribly destructive to forests in North America."

Some of his favorite moths are in the subfamily Arctiinae. "They're called Tiger Moths because of their colors and amazing ability to resemble stinging wasps. We have a very large worldwide collection of this group.” 

Worldwide, scientists have described about 18,000 species of butterflies and 180,000 species of moths, "and hundreds of newly named species are added every year," Smith said. "It's also believed that we may know of no more than 10-15 percent of the species actually out there, with the small 'micro-Lepidoptera' likely with over 90 percent of the species in the world still unknown. This emphasizes the importance of preserving natural environments so things don't go extinct before we can ever recognize their importance to the Earth and their relationships in their habitats. '

In his own words: 

How many specimens have you spread?

“I believe I typically spread 6,000 or more moths and butterflies each year for the past 30 plus years, and at this moment, I am spreading several thousand specimens just brought back from another Belize excursion. Everything butterfly or moth that comes to the museum is handed to me to curate, label, identify, and incorporate into the collection, which I believe may now house nearly 3/4 million Lepidoptera.” 

How many specimen drawers have you made?

“To date I have made and donated 2,475 drawers, and in my garage shop I am currently making another 23 as the museum suddenly became short on empty drawers. About 1/4 of the drawers have been out of repurposed redwood from old decks and fencing.  

Estimated number of hours you've donated to the Bohart?

“This is difficult to say, as most of the work I do is at home (Rocklin) on a daily basis, perhaps 2 to 3 hours each day. I get into the museum once a week to put away what I've done at home, so 9 to 10 hours there as well. Even on vacations away from home I take projects to work on daily on my computer-- spreadsheets, new unit tray labels, new pull tab labels, so that adds many more hours as well, and I've been doing this for 35 years.” 

Woodworking Skills.  Smith is known for his woodworking skills, as exemplified by his intricate specimen drawers. The cost? "The drawers alone would cost about $60 each," he estimated, "so a savings of about $150,000." He added: "I am a volunteer, so the hours I put in are at no cost to the museum. I make and provide all the spreading boards for those classes, along with pins and specimens. I realize that I have saved the museum a great deal of money, but still believe that it is I who am the lucky one to have this quality research museum at my disposal for my passion with insects.” 

Smith is an active member of the international Lepidopterists' Society (since 1967). He and his colleagues hosted the 2019 meeting of the Lepidopterists' Society in Davis. 

Now, back to "The Gold Standard."

"The Gold Standard” praise came from Professor Paul Opler (1938-2023) of Colorado State University, an international authority on Lepidoptera and author of noted books on butterflies and moths, including the Peterson Field Guide to Butterflies of Eastern North America, the Peterson Field Guide to Butterflies of Western North America, Butterflies East of the Great Plains: An Illustrated Natural History, and Moths of Western North America. butterflies. Opler (who by the way, served as the first editor of American Entomologist, published by the Entomological Society of  America), received his doctorate in entomology in 1970 from UC Berkeley,

“About 10 years ago, Paul spent a few days in the Bohart going through our Notodontidae collection in preparation for a revision of that family now available,” Smith recalled. Upon returning home, Opler emailed Smith:  “I consider the Bohart Lepidoptera collection to be The Gold Standard to which we all should aspire.”

“That huge compliment," Smith said, "spoke to the time I have spent with this magnificent collection."

247 years!

The seven faculty members honored at the UC Davis Department of Entomology and Nematology's recent retirement luncheon amassed an amazing 247 years of service:

• UC Davis distinguished professor James Carey, 44 years, faculty member since 1980. He retired in June.
• UC Davis distinguished professor Richard Karban, 42 years, faculty member since 1982. He retired in June.
• UC Davis distinguished professor emerita Lynn Kimsey, 35 years, faculty member since 1989. She retired Feb. 1, 2024.
• Robert Kimsey, adjunct professor, 35 years, faculty member since 1989. He retired in June
• UC Davis distinguished professor Jay Rosenheim, 34 years, faculty member since 1990. He retired in June.
• UC Davis distinguished professor Diane Ullman, 29 years, faculty member since 1995. She retired in June.
• Sharon Lawler, professor emerita, 28 years, faculty member since 1995. She retired in January 2023.

Read about them on our UC Davis Entomology and Nematology website, with links to individual stories. You may have interacted with one or more of them through their research, teaching or public service.

As molecular geneticist and physiologist Joanna Chiu, professor and chair of the department, said prior to the retirement luncheon: “Our retiring faculty will leave behind some very big shoes to fill. “They have set the bar very high for all of us with their passion to lifelong scientific exploration, perseverance to achieve intellectual and mentoring excellence, and dedication to the department, UC Davis, and external stakeholders. We are so proud to call them colleagues and mentors and they will no doubt continue to inspire us to carry on their legacy. It is with our most sincere appreciation that we wish all of them the best in their new endeavors and adventures in this next chapter of their lives."

247 years of service!