Bug Squad

It's a buggy kind of Christmas. Mussen/Garvey style. You've heard "The 12 Days of Christmas," beginning with a single "partridge in a pear tree" and ending with "12 drummers drumming.

So, hurry down the chimney, tonight! So goes a line from "Santa Baby." The songwriters (J. Javits, P. Springer and T. Springer) listed all the good presents they wanted Santa to bring: a sable, a '54 convertible (light blue, please!), a yacht, a duplex and a deed to a platinum mine.

We can help save the monarch butterflies by saving the "sacred" trees in central Mexico where most of the migrating population overwinters. Science journalist Janet Marinelli, writing in Yalee360, said it well in her Dec. 21st piece, "To Protect Monarch: a Plan to Save the Sacred Firs.

Bee scientists and bee enthusiasts are among those looking forward to the UC Davis Chancellor's Colloquium on Monday, Feb. 22. That's when eminent honey bee scientist Gene E.

Our nation's wild bees--which include bumble bees, squash bees and leafcutter bees--are in trouble. A newly published study in the Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences reveals just how much trouble.