Bug Blog
Ootheca! Ootheca! Ootheca!
If you've been pruning bushes or trees, check to see if a praying mantis egg case (ootheca) is attached to a limb. If you do, you're in luck! A mantis deposits her egg case in late summer or...
An egg case or ootheca of a praying mantis. Mama, a Stagmomantis limbata, deposited it on a redbud tree.(Photo by Kathy Keatley Garvey)
What's that on the clothespin? An ootheca or praying mantis egg case. (Photo by Kathy Keatley Garvey)
About 150 nymphs emerged April 9, 2022 from this ootheca deposited on a clothespin. (Photo by Kathy Keatley Garvey)
A female praying mantis, Stagmomantis limbata, waiting for prey. (Photo by Kathy Keatley Garvey)
Presenting: A Butterfly and a Fly
A gray butterfly and a fruit fly... Each has "fly" in its name but one is a member of the order Lepidoptera and the other, order Diptera. Etymology does not agree with...
A fruit fly, Neotephritis finalis, peers up at a gray hairstreak butterfly, Strymon melinus, in a bed of Coreopsis. (Photo by Kathy Keatley Garvey)
Closeup of a fruit fly, Neotephritis finalis, an organism commonly known as a "sunflower seed maggot." Green is reflected in its eyes. (Photo by Kathy Keatley Garvey)
Today's Honorary Bee Image Award Goes to...a Fly
Today's Honorary Bee Image Award goes to...drum roll...an image of a humble hoverfly appearing on the National Geographic Facebook page. The caption reads "A bee sits on a marigold flower in...
A National Geographic Facebook image shows a hover fly masquerading as a bee.
A drone fly, Eristalis tenax, sipping nectar from a Mexican sunflower, Tithonia rotundifola. It is often mistaken for a bee. Eristalis is a large genus of hoverflies, family Syrphidae, in the order Diptera. (Photo by Kathy Keatley Garvey)
A honey bee, Apis mellifera, sipping nectar from a Mexican sunflower, Tithonia rotundifola. (Photo by Kathy Keatley Garvey)
Mary Louise Flint's Article in The Acorn: 'Butterflies in Decline'
You won't want to miss the cover story, "Butterflies in Decline," in the spring 2024 issue of The Acorn, the quarterly magazine published by the Effie Yeaw Nature Center. The center,...
A pipevine swallowtail nectaring on Jupiter's beard in Vacaville. (Photo by Kathy Keatley Garvey)
UC Davis Faculty Award Recipients to Be Celebrated May 13
Congratulations again to the recipients of the 2024 UC Davis Academic Senate and Academic Federation awards. As mentioned earlier, two members of the Academic Senate's winners' circle are UC Davis...
Recipients of the 2024 Academic Senate and Federation Awards include UC Davis Distinguished Professor Walter Leal (top row, far left) and Professor Louie Yang (top row, fifth from left.)(Collage courtesy of UC Davis Dateline)