Agricultural Extension specialist Ian Grettenberger, coordinator of the UC Davis Department of Entomology and Nematology's seminars, has announced the list of the virtual seminars for the winter quarter.

All seminars will be held on Wednesdays at 4:10 PM (PST). Zoom links will be accessible via a Google form link. 

Wednesday, Jan. 20 
Daniel Hasegawa, Ph.D  
USDA-ARS, Crop Improvement and Protection Research: Salinas, Calif.
Title: "Landscape and Molecular Approaches for Managing Thrips and Thrips-transmitted Viruses in the Salinas Valley of California."  
Website link  
Google form link to access the seminar
Host: Ian Grettenberger

Wednesday, Jan. 27
Charissa deBekker, Ph.D  
University of Central Florida, Biology Department 
Title: "What Makes a Zombie Ant Tick? Connecting Genomes with Behavioral Phenomes in Ants, Manipulated by a Fungal Parasite."
Google form link to access seminar
Website link 
Host: Ian Grettenberger

Wednesday, Feb. 3 
Shalene Jha, Ph.D 
University of Texas, Austin, Department of Integrative Biology
Title: "Plant-Insect Interactions and Ecosystem Services in the Context of Global Change"
Website link 
Host: Charlie Nicholson, postdoctoral researcher, Neal Williams lab and Elina Lastro Niño lab

Wednesday, Feb. 10 
Estelí Jimenez-Soto, Ph.D 
UC Santa Cruz, Environmental Studies Department
Title: Pending
Website link 
Host: Marshall McMunn, postdoctoral fellow, Rachel Vannette lab

Wednesday, Feb. 17 
Brian Weiss, Ph.D
Yale University, Department of Epidemiology of Microbial Diseases
Title: Pending
Website link 
Host: Geoff Attardo, assistant professor 

Wednesday, Feb. 24 
Jessica Kansman, Ph.D
Pennsylvania State University, Department of Entomology
Title: Pending
Website link 
Host: Ian Grettenberger

Wednesday, March 3 
Monika Gulia-Nuss, Ph.D
University of Nevada, Reno, Department of Biochemistry and Molecular Biology 
Title: Pending 
Website link 
Host: Geoff Attardo, assistant professor 

Wednesday, March 10
Romina Rader, Ph.D
University of New England, School of Environmental and Rural Science
Title: Pending
Website link 
Host: Neal Williams, professor

For questions, contact Grettenberger at imgrettenberger@ucdavis.edu.

A UC Davis postdoctoral researcher who studied with global bumble bee authority Robbin Thorp is fittingly the winner of the Bohart Museum of Entomology's inaugural Robbin Thorp Memorial First-Bumble-Bee-of-the-Year Contest. 

Charlie Casey Nicholson photographed a black-tailed bumble bee, Bombus melanopygus, in a manzanita patch   at 3:10 p.m., Thursday, Jan. 14 in the UC Davis Arboretum and Public Garden to claim the honor.  The site is near Old Davis Road.

He noted this was his seventh observation field trip to look for the first bumble bee of the year. He had searched six previous times (three 10-minute observations on the manzanita on each of two other days, Jan.  6 and 7).

The contest seeks a photograph--not a specimen--of the year's first bumble bee within the two-county area of Yolo and Solano, said coordinator Lynn Kimsey, director of the Bohart Museum and UC Davis professor of entomology.  

As the winner, Nicholson will receive a special Bohart bumble bee coffee cup and a face mask, said Kimsey.  

Nicholson, a researcher in the UC Davis Department of Entomology and Nematology labs of Professor Neal Williams, a pollination ecologist, and Extension apiculturist Elina Lastro Niño, is a 2015 alumnus of The Bee Course, where Robbin Thorp, a UC Davis distinguished professor of entomology, taught from 2002 through 2018.  The nine-day intensive workshop, geared for conservation biologists and pollination ecologists and considered the world's premiere native bee biology and taxonomic course, takes place annually in Portal, Ariz., at the Southwestern Research Station, part of the American Museum of Natural History, N.Y. 

"It is truly an honor to win the contest," said Nicholson. "I was a student of Robbin's during the 17th annual Bee Course in Portal, Ariz. I will never forget him wielding his canopy net."  

"The first night (8/17/2015) he gave the opening seminar--a whirlwind tour of what makes a bee. It was so exciting to be at this research station surrounded by people whose names you've read all the time.”

“Robbin helped me learn to pay close attention to the arolia of Anthidiini. As we moved into identifying bees, Robbin was a great teacher as we worked through the dichotomous keys in The Bee Genera of North and Central America: Hymenoptera Apoidea. He always had some morphological signpost that wouldn't give away the 'answer' but would certainly guide you in the right direction." 

Charlie holds a bachelor of arts degree in biology (evolution, ecology and behavior), 2010, cum laude,  from Skidmore College, Saratoga Springs, New York. He received his doctorate in natural resources in 2018 from the University of Vermont, where he was a Gund Institute for Environment graduate fellow. In his dissertation, he examined how landscape and farm management affect the multiple benefits provided by wild bees. 

Nicholson joined UC Davis as a postdoctoral scholar in the spring of 2019, and receives funding support from the USDA Invasive Species and Pollinator Health Unit. He recently co-authored a paper, “Natural Hazard Threats to Pollinators and Pollination,” published in the journal Global Change Biology, that analyzed 117 published research papers on natural hazards that threaten pollinators and pollination. 

His other interests include multiple dimensions of biodiversity, conservation planning, agricultural management, ecosystem services, and community and landscape ecology. 

Robbin Thorp 
Thorp, a member of the UC Davis entomology faculty for 30 years, from 1964-1994, died June 7, 2019 at his Davis home at age 85. A tireless advocate of pollinator species protection and conservation, Thorp was known for his expertise, dedication and passion in protecting native pollinators, especially bumble bees, and for his teaching, research and public service. He was an authority on pollination ecology, ecology and systematics of honey bees, bumble bees, vernal pool bees, conservation of bees, native bees and crop pollination, and bees of urban gardens and agricultural landscapes.

He achieved emeritus status in 1994 but continued to engage in research, teaching and public service until a few weeks before his death. In 2014, he co-authored two books Bumble Bees of North America: An Identification Guide (Princeton University, 2014) and California Bees and Blooms: A Guide for Gardeners and Naturalists (Heyday, 2014).

Every summer from 2002 to 2018, Thorp volunteered his time and expertise to be one of the instructors in The Bee Course. In a 2013 interview with the UC Davis Department of Entomology and Nematology, Thorp said he loved teaching at The Bee Course and praised the co-instructors and students. "Ron McGinley who got his undergraduate degree at UC Davis does most of the initial student contact and scheduling for the course. Steve Buchmann, who got his PhD at UC Davis in 1978, is one of the instructors.  There are usually about eight instructors and 22 participants for the course.  Most of the time is spent in the lab identifying bees to genus.  At least three days are spent in the field so students can see various bees doing their thing, collect them and bring them back to the lab to identify them.  It is a great experience for students to interact with instructors and especially with their peers from around the world.  Instructors all donate their time to teach in the course, but benefit from the chance to get together with colleagues and a new cohort of interesting students each year.  Every class is different (that is, it takes on its own personality) and each student brings something new and different to the mix."

Highly honored by his peers, Thorp was named a fellow of the California Academy of Sciences, San Francisco in 1986; recipient of the Edward A. Dickson Emeriti Professorship of UC Davis in 2010; and recipient of the UC Davis campuswide Distinguished Emeritus Award in 2015. Other honors included: member of the UC Davis Bee Team that won the 2013 Team Award from the Pacific Branch, Entomological Society of America. In addition, he served as a past president (2010-2011) of the Davis Botanical Society, and chair (1992-2011) of the Advisory Committee for the Jepson Prairie Reserve, UC Davis/Natural Reserve System.  

The UC Davis Insect Ecology Group has named Arnold Menke's publication on "The Ammophila of North and Central America (Hymenoptera, Sphecidae)" as one of the best papers of 2020.

Every year the UC Davis Insect Ecology group lists its favorite papers, said community ecologist Rachel Vannette of the UC Davis Department of Entomology and Nematology. She listed the group's favorites on her lab website and also listed her lab's picks.

Menke, who received his doctorate in entomology from UC Davis in 1965, studying with Professor Richard Bohart (for whom the Bohart Museum of Entomology is named), is a noted expert on wasps. Ammophila are sometimes called "thread-waisted wasps" or "sand wasps" but neither is definitive. Ammophila comes from the Greek "sand lover." (See BugGuide.net for images.)

A partial abstract of the Menke publication:
"The North and Central American species of Ammophila are described and a key provided for their identification. Sixty-nine species are recognized, of which 62 are known from North America. The other seven are known only from Mexico. Four new species are described, hallelujah from northeastern California, linda from southern California, mexica and zapoteca from south central Mexico."  

Mencke is also the co-author of "Funny or Curious Zoological Names." Included in the list: he named a species of Australian wasp, "Aha ha," as a joke. From Wikipedia: "Menke described several years after its discovery how, when he received a package from a colleague containing insect specimens, he exclaimed 'Aha, a new genus,' with fellow entomologist Eric Grissell responding "ha" doubtfully. The name of the insect is commonly found in lists of bizarre scientific names. The name was also used as the vehicle registration plate of Menke's car, "AHA HA."

The UC Davis Insect Ecology list: 

• Lonsdorf, E.V., Koh, I. and Ricketts, T., 2020. Partitioning private and external benefits of crop pollination services. People and Nature, 2(3), pp.811-820. https://bit.ly/2XGUrLm
  
• Nichols, Bethany S., Gerhard Leubner‐Metzger, and Vincent AA Jansen. “Between a rock and a hard place: adaptive sensing and site‐specific dispersal.” Ecology Letters 23.9 (2020): 1370-1379.
 
https://bit.ly/39r1sVK 
  
  
• Eberl, F., Fernandez de Bobadilla, M., Reichelt, M., Hammerbacher, A., Gershenzon, J. and Unsicker, S.B. (2020), Herbivory meets fungivory: insect herbivores feed on plant pathogenic fungi for their own benefit. Ecol Lett, 23: 1073-1084. https://bit.ly/3iccPFf
  
  
• Larsen, C.D. and Hargreaves, A.L., 2020. Miniaturizing landscapes to understand species distributions. Ecography. 
https://bit.ly/2MV4olZ
  
  
• Koski, M.H., MacQueen, D. and Ashman, T.L., 2020. Floral pigmentation has responded rapidly to global change in ozone and temperature. Current Biology, 30(22), pp.4425-4431. https://bit.ly/39zfnZX
  
  
• Lundgren, E. J., Ramp, D., Rowan, J., Middleton, O., Schowanek, S. D., Sanisidro, O., … & Wallach, A. D. (2020). Introduced herbivores restore Late Pleistocene ecological functions. Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences, 117(14), 7871-7878. https://bit.ly/3ilILHm
  
  
• Pashalidou, F.G., Lambert, H., Peybernes, T., Mescher, M.C. and De Moraes, C.M., 2020. Bumble bees damage plant leaves and accelerate flower production when pollen is scarce. Science, 368(6493), pp.881-884. 
https://bit.ly/3bGdI7O
  
  
• Losapio, G., & Schöb, C. (2020). Pollination interactions reveal direct costs and indirect benefits of plant–plant facilitation for ecosystem engineers. Journal of Plant Ecology, 13(1), 107-113.
 https://bit.ly/2XJ3v22
  
  
• LeCroy, K.A., Savoy-Burke, G., Carr, D.E., Delaney, D.A. and T'ai, H.R., 2020. Decline of six native mason bee species following the arrival of an exotic congener. Scientific Reports, 10(1), pp.1-9. 
https://go.nature.com/3nJUaSq 
  
  
• Milet-Pinheiro, P., Domingos-Melo, A., Olivera, J.B., Albuquerque, N.S., Costa, A.C.G., Albuquerque-Lima, S., Silva, M.F., Navarro, D.M., Maia, A.C., Gundersen, L.L. and Schubert, M., 2020. A Semivolatile Floral Scent Marks the Shift to a Novel Pollination System in Bromeliads. Current Biology. 
https://bit.ly/3ihb6yy
  
  
• Adams, J.V. and Jones, M.L., 2020. Evidence of host switching: Sea lampreys disproportionately attack Chinook salmon when lake trout abundance is low in Lake Ontario. Journal of Great Lakes Research. 
https://bit.ly/3syTQcT 
  
  
• Twardochleb, L.A., Treakle, T.C. and Zarnetske, P.L., 2020. Foraging strategy mediates ectotherm predator–prey responses to climate warming. Ecology, 101(11), p.e03146. 
https://bit.ly/3sqZtJR 
  
  
• Menke, A. S.  2020.  The Ammophila of North & Central America (Hymenoptera, Sphecidae).  (No link available. This can ordered from the Bohart Museum of Entomology)
  
  
• Luttbeg et al. 2020 Safety cues give prey more valuable information than danger cues. Am Nat. 195:636-648
 https://bit.ly/2LO3A1Y
  
  
• Mathis, K.A. and Bronstein, J.L., 2020. Our Current Understanding of Commensalism. Annual Review of Ecology, Evolution, and Systematics, 51, pp.167-189. 
https://bit.ly/3nG7zuJ
  
  
• Simmonds, E. G., E. F. Cole, B. C. Sheldon, and T. Coulson. 2020. Phenological asynchrony: a ticking time-bomb for seemingly stable populations? Ecology Letters 23:1766–1775. https://bit.ly/35I6oVd
  

The Vannette lab picks:

• Trunz, V., Lucchetti, M. A., Bénon, D., Dorchin, A., Desurmont, G. A., Kast, C., … & Praz, C. J. (2020). To bee or not to bee: The ‘raison d'être'of toxic secondary compounds in the pollen of Boraginaceae. Functional Ecology, 34(7), 1345-1357. https://bit.ly/2XG0lMz
  
  
• Malone, S.C., Weaver, D.K., Seipel, T.F. et al. Herbivore-induced volatile emissions are altered by soil legacy effects in cereal cropping systems. Plant Soil 455, 171–186 (2020). https://bit.ly/3icfYVz
  
  
• Derek W Dunn, Stability in fig tree–fig wasp mutualisms: how to be a cooperative fig wasp, Biological Journal of the Linnean Society, Volume 130, Issue 1, May 2020, Pages 1–17, https://bit.ly/2LLjbzb
  
  
• Goelen, T., Sobhy, I. S., Vanderaa, C., Wäckers, F., Rediers, H., Wenseleers, T., et al. 2020. Bacterial phylogeny predicts volatile organic compound composition and olfactory response of an aphid parasitoid. Oikos. https://bit.ly/2N25TPn
  
  
• Imachi H, Nobu MK, Nakahara N, Morono Y, Ogawara M, Takaki Y, et al. Isolation of an archaeon at the prokaryote–eukaryote interface. Nature. 2020 Jan 23;577(7791):519–25. Available from: https://bit.ly/2XFDzV1
  
  
• Prado A, Marolleau B, Vaissière BE, Barret M, Torres-Cortes G. Insect pollination: an ecological process involved in the assembly of the seed microbiota. Sci Rep. 2020;10(1):1–11. https://bit.ly/3oNj9W5
  
  
• Pashalidou, F.G., Lambert, H., Peybernes, T., Mescher, M.C. and De Moraes, C.M., 2020. Bumble bees damage plant leaves and accelerate flower production when pollen is scarce. Science, 368(6493), pp.881-884. 
https://bit.ly/2KfKnFP
  
  
• Pozo, M. I., van Kemenade, G., van Oystaeyen, A., Aledón‐Catalá, T., Benavente, A., Van den Ende, W., Wäckers, F., and Jacquemyn, H.. 2020. The impact of yeast presence in nectar on bumble bee behavior and fitness. Ecological Monographs 90( 1):e01393. 10.1002/ecm.1393

The UC Davis Department of Entomology and Nematology is sharing a $900,000 grant from the University of California's Office of the President to establish a four-campus network of bee researchers and engineers to strengthen honey bee health and crop pollination. 

The three-year grant, titled "Strengthening Honey Bee Health and Crop Pollination to Safeguard Food Availability and Affordability" and headed by principal investigator Boris Baer, a UC Riverside professor of entomology, also includes the San Diego and Merced campuses. “I'm very excited about so many different kinds of bee expertise joining forces through this project,” Baer said. 

"Most excitingly, this funding will not only support research that will help improve pollinator health so crucial for California's agriculture, but it will provide opportunities for training of students and postdoctoral scholars,” said co-principal investigator, Extension apiculturist Elina Lastro Niño of the UC Davis Department of Entomology and Nematology, which operates the Harry H. Laidlaw Jr. Honey Bee Research Facility. “Work focused on improving honey bee stocks via novel tools aligns well with ongoing work in the Niño lab and will further cement collaborations with beekeepers and growers.” 

Honey bees pollinate more than 80 agricultural crops, accounting for about a third of the American diet.  Researchers attribute the widespread collapse of bee colonies over the past decade to several factors, including pesticide exposure, spread of parasites and pathogens, habitat destruction and environmental changes.  Population declines have resulted in decreased pollination services and increased food prices. Worldwide declines continue despite substantial efforts of researchers, beekeepers, conservationists, and growers to identify the issues facing pollinator communities and develop innovative solutions. 

The UC scientists plan a three-pronged approach to resolve the issue: develop better breeding programs, better medications and treatments, and better tools to monitor bee health in the hives. Small “listening and smelling” devices will be placed inside the hives to monitor bee health.

“We know bee queens have a special pheromone they give off when they're hungry or dying, and these can be traced,” Baer said. “We are essentially building ‘electronic veterinarians.” Preventative devices like these are key to keeping bees alive, because once the colony collapses, it's too late to bring it back, he added.  “Together, we'll develop innovative tools needed to effectively combat declining honeybee health, keep our food affordable, and safeguard the livelihood of those working with bees."

In the successful grant proposal, part of the Multicampus Research Programs and Initiatives (MRPI), the researchers wrote:

"Safeguarding honey bees and their pollination services requires beekeepers to be better able to manage the health and survival of colonies, which requires research into the causal factors and interactions affecting pollinator health, and the development and implementation of novel tools in close collaboration with industry partners. To do this, we will form a California wide, cross disciplinary research network and 

1. experimentally study the ecological and molecular factors and their interactions that affect honey bee health and their interactions to identify biomarkers of their health
2. use the knowledge gained to develop and deliver new, effective solutions for stakeholders, including remote sensing of bee health, a marker-assisted breeding program, and the development of novel medications,
3. build a research industry nexus to conduct collaborative research. We will also develop and deploy new extension and outreach modules that will be offered through UC Cooperative Extension statewide. We will support California beekeepers to build and maintain a sustainable and profitable beekeeping industry, which has implications for food security on a national level."

Niño, who works closely with California beekeepers, launched and directs the California Master Beekeeper Program, which uses science-based information to educate stewards and ambassadors for honey bees and beekeeping.

The co-principal investigators also noted in their grant proposal that "The current coronavirus pandemic and impending recession is putting more pressure on agriculture to provide sufficient and affordable food. Honey bees are key to such efforts, and supporting a California based beekeeping industry also decreases the state's dependence on managed pollination from elsewhere, thereby creating new jobs and income."

Funding also will help provide research opportunities for undergraduates, including underrepresented students, with the goal of ensuring that the pipeline of students who enter research, academia, industry, and multiple other professions reflects the diversity of the communities in which they learn and work.

Co-principal investigator James Nieh of UC San Diego, said he and his students will be testing how nutritional supplements may help bees that have been exposed to pesticides and on how to harness the natural honey bee microbiome against a very common bee gut disease.

“We want to use what evolution has already given us to deal with bee disease because this should be a more natural and sustainable approach,” said Nieh, a professor in the Section of Ecology, Behavior and Evolution, Division of Biological Sciences. “Researchers have also focused a great deal on the harms caused by pesticides and this has helped improve some aspects of regulation," he said in a UC San Diego news release. "But we need to develop treatments for bees that are exposed to these chemicals because we will not realistically be able to eliminate all pesticide use.”

Co-principal investigator Joshua Kohn of UC San Diego said research in his lab is aimed at understanding the complex genomes of feral honey bees in Southern California. These bees have genomes that are a complex mixture of genomes of honey bee varieties from Africa, Europe and the Middle East,  Kohn said in a UC San Diego news release. He described the feral  bees as "highly genetically diverse and ecologically successful." Their genomes, he pointed out, likely hold variation useful to breeding domesticated honey bees with increased levels of resistance to the common diseases that currently plague the honey bee industry.

“This network of bee researchers comprises a unique mixture of expertise that can apply highly multidisciplinary approaches to benefit the honey bee industry essential to the production of many of California's most economically important crops,” Kohn related.

Other co-principal investigators are Kerry Mauck, Tsotras Vassilis, and Kim Hyoseung, all of UC Riverside. Marilia Gaiarsa of UC Merced is a co-investigator.