Archive Nut, Prune and Olive Programs

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FIELD OF REDMAIDS, California native wildflowers, near the Harry H. Laidlaw Jr. Honey Bee Research Facility at UC Davis. Mixed in are fiddleneck (yellow), also frequented by bees. (Photo by Kathy Keatley Garvey)
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A Patch of Redmaids

April 12, 2010
By Kathy Keatley Garvey
Redmaids aren't red. They're purple-petaled with white centers and yellow stamens. The California native wildflower (Calandrinia ciliatais) from the purslane family (Portulacaceae) blooms from February through May. Farmers who grow baby spinach and other crops consider it a weed. Honey bees don't.
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BARELY VISIBLE, this is a newly hatched praying mantis, held by Emily Bzdyk, a first-year graduate student in entomology at UC Davis. (Photo by Kathy Keatley Garvey)
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No Fear

April 9, 2010
By Kathy Keatley Garvey
No fear. None at all. Some of the bugs you'll see at the UC Davis Picnic Day on Saturday, April 17 at the Bohart Museum of Entomology are "baby" praying mantises or mantids. An egg case (here's one at right) hatched on Emily Bzdyk's desk this week.
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A HONEY BEE lands on a tulip, a plant generally not a "bee friendly plant." (Photo by Kathy Keatley Garvey)
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Tiptoeing Through the Tulips

April 8, 2010
By Kathy Keatley Garvey
Honey bees don't like tulips, right? Right. You don't plant tulips to attract bees, and you don't attract bees with tulips. They prefer such bee friendly plants as lavender, salvia, catmint, sedum, cherry laurels and tower of jewelsnot to mention fruit, almond and vegetable blossoms.
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MY BUDDY--Matan Shelomi, a first-year graduate student in entomology at UC Davis, checks out a lime green walking stick at the Bohart Museum of Entomology. It will be a key attraction at the insect museum on Picnic Day, set April 17. (Photo by Kathy Keatley Garvey)
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Just Buggin' You

April 7, 2010
By Kathy Keatley Garvey
When the University of California, Davis, celebrates its annual Picnic Day on Saturday, April 17, be sure to check out the bugs. Entomologists will showcase insects at the Bohart Museum of Entomology at 1124 Academic Surge on California Drive, and at Briggs Hall, off Kleiber Drive, from 11 a.m.
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CAMPUS BUZZWAY at UC Davis is awash in gold and blue: California poppies and lupine. (Photo by Kathy Keatley Garvey)
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Buzzing at the Campus Buzzway

April 6, 2010
By Kathy Keatley Garvey
The Campus Buzzway, a quarter-acre field of wildflowers planted last fall near the Harry H. Laidlaw Jr. Honey Bee Research Facility at the University of California, Davis, is brilliant in gold and blue, the UC Davis colors. The gold: California poppies. The blue (blue/purple): lupine.
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HELPING TO SAVE the honey bees is Gimbal's Fine Candies, which is donating 5 percent of the proceeds from its Honey Lovers' fruit chews to UC Davis research. Accepting the first check, issued March 8, is Extension apiculturist Eric Mussen (left) from Lance Gimbal, CEO of Gimbal's. (Photo by Kathy Keatley Garvey)
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Sweet!

April 5, 2010
By Kathy Keatley Garvey
Sweet! That one word aptly describes the generous donation by Gimbal's Fine Candies, San Francisco, to aid honey bee research at the Harry H. Laidlaw Jr. Honey Bee Research Facility at the University of California, Davis.
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BLUE SKY, a field of golden mustard and gleaming white hives--it's a picture-perfect day at the Olivarez Honey Bees' farm in Orland, Calif. (Photo by Kathy Keatley Garvey)
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Picture-Perfect Day at a Bee Farm

April 2, 2010
By Kathy Keatley Garvey
Picture this. It's a picture-perfect day on Thursday, April 1 at Olivarez Honey Bees, Inc. in Orland, Calif. Susan Cobey's queen bee-rearing class at the University of California, Davis, is touring the bee farm with guide Ray Olivarez Jr.
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HONEY BEE foraging on mustard at Olivarez Honey Bees, Inc., Orland, Calif. (Photo by Kathy Keatley Garvey)
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Cutting the Mustard

April 1, 2010
By Kathy Keatley Garvey
A golden bee on golden mustard. What could represent spring in California more than that? Well, besides the just-ended almond pollination season. Bee breeder-geneticist Susan Cobey, manager of the Harry H. Laidlaw Jr.
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