Bug Squad

Sometimes when you walk through a bee garden, you feel Mother Nature tugging at your arm, pulling you from one breathtaking area to another. You resist the tug and want to linger, to admire the diversity of bees, to marvel at the colors and patterns of the flowers.

It's good to see UC Davis mosquito researchers featured in the KQED's science program, "Deep Look." KQED journalists recently traveled to the UC Davis campus to visit several mosquito labs.

They're calling it "Bohart Belize Bioblitz," or "B-cubed" or "B to the 3." It's an insect collecting trip to Belize for the Bohart Museum of Entomology, UC Davis.

What happened in our pollinator garden on June 3 probably would have promoted a standing ovation from agriculturists who grow cotton, strawberries, sugarbeets, tomatoes, beans, safflower, potatoes, and other crops. A crab spider nailed a major pest, a lygus bug, Lygus hesperus.

Katydids did it. When it comes to the best of the industrial-strength shredding machines, they're it. The nymphs have been feeding our Iceland poppies, chewing incredible holes in petal after petal, and then looking around for more. They leave behind what looks like shredded cabbage.