Backyard Orchard News
From Honey Bees to Flower Thrips to Asian Longhorned Beetles
From honey bees to flower thrips to Asian longhorned beetles... From a beneficial insect to...
Honey bees will be one of the topics of the UC Davis Department of Entomology and Nematology's winter seminars. (Photo by Kathy Keatley Garvey)
This is a western flower thrips, the topic of Professor Diane Ullman's seminar on Jan. 18. She'll discuss "Journey into the Microcosm: A Closer Look at the Western Flower thrips." (Photo by Jack Kelly Clark, UC ANR)
Bumble Bee Mellowing Out on the Mallow
Nice to see you! That's how we greeted our very last bumble bee of 2016. The yellow-faced bumble...
It looks like...it is! A yellow-faced bumble bee,Bombus vosnesenski, seeking nectar from a mallow blossom at the Natural Bridges State Park, Santa Cruz. (Photo by Kathy Keatley Garvey)
Yellow-faced bumble bee, Bombus vosnesenskii, sipping nectar on mallow on Nov. 14 in Natural Bridges State Park, Santa Cruz. (Photo by Kathy Keatley Garvey)
Side view of yellow-faced bumble bee. (Photo by Kathy Keatley Garvey)
FFA Students Train for Citrus Judging at Lindcove REC
We were very excited this year to provide 100+ varieties of citrus for the general public to taste...
Carpenter Bee: Beneficial Insect or Pest?
Let's face it--some folks are not fond of carpenter bees. Honey bees, yes! Bumble bees, yes!...
A female mountain carpenter bee, Xylocopa tabaniformis orpifex, pierces the corolla of salvia to rob the nectar. (Photo by Kathy Keatley Garvey)
A male mountain carpenter bee, Xylocopa tabaniformis orpifex, heads for bulbine. (Photo by Kathy Keatley Garvey)
A familiar sight: a female Valley carpenter bee, covered with pollen and nectaring on a passion flower. The female is solid black, while the male of this species is a green-eyed blond. (Photo by Kathy Keatley Garvey)
A male Valley carpenter bee, Xyclopa varipuncta, pierces the corolla of a foothill Penstemon. (Photo by Kathy Keatley Garvey)
Female carpenter bees, Xyclopa variuncta, often drill holes in limbs of dead trees to build their nests. This find, from Davis naturalist/photographer Allan Jones, shows a male wintering inside one of the holes. (Photo by Kathy Keatley Garvey)
Interest in Kearney tea plants mentioned in the local abc 30 news broadcast Jan 2nd, 2017.
On January 2nd, 2017, abc 30 news aired a story on the 50 year old tea plants at UC ANR Kearney Agricultural Research and Extension Center. When the 1967 20-yr long Lipton tea project ended, some of the top two cultivars were kept in the general landscaping. The Global Tea Initiative at UC Davis learned that the tea plants survived for fifty years without any special treatment. The initiative plans to do some studies on these plants.