Bug Blog
A Buffet for the Bees
When the honey bee meets the flowering quince, the bee is "the belle of the ball." The winter ball. Suddenly the flowering quince (genus Chaenomele) transforms the bleak wintery landscape into...
Honey bee foraging in a flowering quince. (Photo by Kathy Keatley Garvey)
An upside-down bee in the flowering quince. (Photo by Kathy Keatley Garvey)
Pollen-packing honey bee inside a flowering quince bud. (Photo by Kathy Keatley Garvey)
About Those Non-Social Bees...
About those non-social bees... A good place to learn about them is at the UC Davis Department of Entomology seminar on Wednesday, Feb. 6. James “Jim” Cane, a research entomologist with...
Female mason bee, genus Osmia (Family Megachilidae), as identified by native pollinator specialist/emeritus professor Robbin Thorp of UC Davis. (Photo by Kathy Keatley Garvey)
Our State Insect: Now in a Children's Book
Not many people know that the state insect of California is the California dogface butterfly (Zerene eurydice) or the role that schoolchildren played to attain that honor. Now there's an...
Illustrator Laine Bauer (left) and author Fran Keller.
Cover of "The Story of the Dogface Butterfly"
Bed Bugs at the Bohart
Bed Bugs at the Bohart? Indeed. Those attending the Bohart Museum of Entomology's open house on Saturday, Feb. 2, will see them--and see them feeding. The Bohart Museum of Entomology is one of...
The arm of Danielle Wishon and her bedbugs, feeding.
Close-up of a bedbug in the process of ingesting a blood meal. (Photo courtesy of the Centers for Disease Control for Prevention, image by Piotr Naskrecki)
A She-Bee on the Hebe
The yellow-faced bumble bee, Bombus vosnesenskii, is back. We spotted some overwintering queen bumble bees gathering nectar on a hebe bush last Sunday at the Berkeley marina. Distinguished by...
Queen bumble bee nectaring a hebe at the Berkeley marina. (Photo by Kathy Keatley Garvey)
Queen bumble bee is aglow in the afternoon sun. (Photo by Kathy Keatley Garvey)
Distinguishing yellow stripe on the lower abdomen is barely visible. (Photo by Kathy Keatley Garvey)