Bug Squad

There's something about the cabbage white butterfly (Pieris rapae) that makes folks foam at the mouth.

So you want to keep bees in your backyard... When do you start? What should you do? Newly retired Extension apiculturist Eric Mussen of the UC Davis Department of Entomology and Nematology, continues to field questions.

We have strippers. Not anything to do with that thriving business known as "The Strip Club" in Las Vegas.

If you appreciate honey bees--particularly their pollination services--then you should thank them. Not just on National Honey Bee Day, which is Saturday, Aug. 16, but every day. This year's theme is Sustainable Gardening Begins with Honey Bees.

Honey connoisseur Amina Harris, director of the UC Davis Honey and Pollination Center, opens the jar of lavender honey from France and sniffs the aroma. She breathes in deeply. The "miel de lavande" produced by "apiculteur Marc Agnel" is creamed, as most lavender honeys are, she says.