Diggin' the digger bee... We spotted this female digger bee, Anthophora urbana, zooming in on some zinnias at UC Davis. She buzzed loudly, virtually owning the zinnia patch. Smaller sweat bees scattered.
Meet a carpenter bee. This one (below) is a male carpenter bee, Xylocopa tabaniformis orpifex, as identified by native pollinator specialist Robbin Thorp, emeritus professor of entomology at the University of California, Davis. It's also called a "mountain" or "foothill" carpenter bee.
Don't look now, but a garden spider almost grabbed a tiger by the tail. The tiger? That would be the Western tiger swallowtail, Papilio rutulus. The ragged wings of the butterfly (below) show signs of a close encounter with a predator--maybe another spider, a praying mantis or a bird.
The drama unfolds slowly. The crafty praying mantis that's perched atop a zinnia raises its spiked, grasping forelegs and silently waits for unsuspecting prey. A sweat bee cruises by. Then a second one. Then a third. They do not land and the praying mantis does not move.
Ah, the little intricacies of life... We were walking along a stretch of the coastal town of Bodega Bay when we spotted something we'd never seen before: a bubble on a syrphid fly. Syrphid flies, also known as hover flies or flower flies, are pollinators, just like honey bees.
The history of California processing tomato production is an impressive success story. Over the past 90 years, the tomato industry has boosted per-acre production by 740 percent. The state accounts for more than 95 percent of U.S. processing tomatoes.
During the day, European wool carder bees (so named because the females collect or "card" plant fuzz for their nests) forage on our catmint and lamb's ear. These bees, Anthidium manicatum, are about the size of a honey bee, but with striking yellow and black markings.
To commemorate National Honey Bee Day, Jefferson Exchange host Geoffrey Riley of Jefferson Public Radio, Southern Oregon University, recently booked a trio of experts to talk about honey bees. The broadcast, aired Aug.
In a clear sign of changing times in California agriculture, the University of California dedicates its first full-sized center pivot overhead irrigation system at the UC West Side Research and Extension Center during the Twilight Conservation Agriculture field day at 4 p.m. Sept. 13.
If you want to learn more about honey bees and other pollinators, then The Bounty of Pollination: More Than Just Honey is the place to bee on Saturday, Oct 27 at the Robert Mondavi Institute for Wine and Food Science (RMI), University of California, Davis.
