Bug Blog
'Double-Spined Murder Clamps' at the Ready
So here's this tiny praying mantis hovering over a spider's web in the bluebeard (Caryopteris clandonensis) in our pollinator garden. In the web are freshly caught prey, including a honey bee. Now...
A young praying mantis keeps looking down at a spider's web in the bluebeard blossoms. (Photo by Kathy Keatley Garvey)
If you've ever been puzzled by all those anatomical parts of a praying mantis, no worries. Macro photographer and life-long entomology enthusiast Darren McNabb of Darren's Bugs has figured it all out. (Meme used with permission)
How Do You Weigh a Bumble Bee? Ask UC Davis Entomologists and Engineers
A bumble bee news story released today by Andy Fell of UC Davis News and Media Relations is a great example of scientific collaboration between entomologists and engineers. How it all began:...
A bumble bee leaving an experimental colony housed in a cooler. The "bee scale" to weigh the insects has to be placed in this tunnel. (Photo by Kathy Keatley Garvey)
UC Davis pollination ecologist Neal Williams with a bee colony housed in a cooler. Williams and his team hope to understand the demographics of bumble bee colonies, including weighing individual bees as they enter or leave the hive. (Photo by Kathy Keatley Garvey)
How to Plan a Menu for a Crab Spider
Dear Crab Spider, Please don't eat the pollinators. You may help yourself to a mosquito, a crane fly, a lygus bug, an aphid, and a katydid, not necessarily in that order. And more than one if you...
A crab spider dines on a sweat bee, a female Halictus tripartitus (as identified by native pollinator specialist Robbin Thorp, distinguished emeritus professor of entomology at UC Davis). (Photo by Kathy Keatley Garvey)
Missed! A male long-horned bee, probably Melissodes agilis, eludes the crab spider. (Photo by Kathy Keatley Garvey)
A crab spider on top of the world, the cone of a petal-less blanket flower (Gaillardia). (Photo by Kathy Keatley Garvey)
Hey, I can wait all day. And I will. I'm a Wait Watcher. (Photo by Kathy Keatley Garvey)
Happy Independence Day!
Today we celebrate the Fourth of July, also known as Independence Day. History books tell us that on July 4, 1776, the Continental Congress adopted the Declaration of Independence, declaring the 13...
A newly eclosed female monarch butterfly, Danaus plexippus, touches down on an American flag. Another star. (Photo by Kathy Keatley Garvey)
What's Better than Sighting a Bumble Bee?
What's better than sighting a yellow-faced bumble bee, Bombus vosnesenskii? Well, a newly emerged Bombus vosnesenskii queen. On the last day of June, we spotted this fresh queen-looking foraging on...
A newly emerged yellow-faced bumble bee queen, Bombus vosnesenskii, eyes the photographer as it forages on blanket flower (Gaillardia). (Photo by Kathy Keatley Garvey)
Yellow-faced bumble bee shows its distinguishing marks. This is a queen Bombus vosnesenskii, about 21mm long. (Photo by Kathy Keatley Garvey)
Up and away! A distinguishing feature of Bombus vosnesenskii is the yellow stripe, T4 segment of its thorax. (Photo by Kathy Keatley Garvey)