Backyard Orchard News
Bee-ing All You Can Be and See and Do
What a weekend for bee and gardening enthusiasts! It's a shame we all can't clone ourselves and be...
A native bee, Anthophora urbana, buzzes over a tropical milkweed. (Photo by Kathy Keatley Garvey)
Bohart Museum Open House: How to Pin a Butterfly
When the UC Davis Bohart Museum of Entomology hosts an open house, "Insects and U" on Sunday...
Entomologist Jeff Smith curates the butterfly and moth collection at the Bohart Museum of Entomology. (Photo by Kathy Keatley Garvey)
Curator Jeff Smith displays specimens in the butterfly and moth collection at the Bohart Museum of Entomology. (Photo by Kathy Keatley Garvey)
The Day That The Beetles Invaded the Bohart
Just call it "The Day that the Beetles Invaded the Bohart." That would be the recent open house at...
USDA Forest Research entomologist Steve Seybold (foreground) and UC Davis graduate student Corwin Parker peel bark to reveal larvae of bark beetles and wood borers. (Photo by Kathy Keatley Garvey)
UC Davis graduate student Corwin Parker examines a conifer for beetles. (Photo by Kathy Keatley Garvey)
Children flocked to the crafts table to create art focused on bark beetles. (Photo by Kathy Keatley Garvey)
Natalie Seybold (left) works on bark beetle art. In the background is Bohart Museum associate Mai Lundy. (Photo by Kathy Keatley Garvey)
Bark beetle art in the making--this is the work of Natalie Seybold of Davis. She is coloring an outline of a Dendroctonus sp. bark beetle, probably the red turpentine beetle, Dendroctonus valens, or the great spruce beetle, Dendroctonus micans. (Photo by Kathy Keatley Garvey)
This is staining to a cross section of ponderosa pine, Pinus ponderosa, by a blue-staining fungus carried by the western pine beetle, Dendroctonus brevicomis. In the background: pitch tubes around the entrance holes of western pine beetle, Dendroctonus brevicomis, on the bark surface of ponderosa pine, Pinus ponderosa.(Photo by Kathy Keatley Garvey)
Entomologist Wade Spencer, a UC Davis undergraduate student and Bohart Museum associate, reads a children's book, "Beetle Bedlam." (Photo by Kathy Keatley Garvey)
Bohart Museum Open House: 'Insects and U'
Mark your calendar! Here's an opportunity--especially for new students and prospective students at...
A cabbage white butterfly, Pieris rapae, nectaring on catmint. (Photo by Kathy Keatley Garvey)
Photobomb! A cabbage white butterfly, Pieris rapae, photobombs a bee nectaring on bluebeard, Caryopteris x clandonensis. (Photo by Kathy Keatley Garvey)
The Sneaky Cuckoo Bee
You could call it a slacker, a deadbeat, a moocher, a sponger, or a loafer. Or you could call it a...
A cuckoo bee, Xeromelecta californica, sips nectar from a tropical milkweed, Asclepias curassavica, in Vacaville, Calif. (Photo by Kathy Keatley Garvey)
Close-up of a cuckoo bee, Xeromelecta californica, on a tropical milkweed, Asclepias curassavica. (Photo by Kathy Keatley Garvey)
A digger bee, Anthophora urbana, sips nectar from lavender. The cuckoo bee, Xeromelecta californica, is a parasite of Anthophora. It lays eggs in the host's nest, resulting in death of the host's offspring. (Photo by Kathy Keatley Garvey)