Bug Squad

Bumble bee on bull thistle at Bodega Bay
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A territorial bee, a male Melissodes agilis, confronts a monarch butterfly in a Vacaville, Calif. pollinator garden. The prize relinquished: a Mexican sunflower, Tithonia rotundifola. (Photo by Kathy Keatley Garvey)
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A Tiff on the Tithonia

May 27th, 2021
It was July 3, 2020. The male bees, Melissodes agilis, were getting quite territorial. Every time a butterfly, a honey bee or another insect in our family's pollinator garden expressed an interest in foraging on the Mexican sunflowers, Tithonia rotundifola, a male Melissodes buzzed them.
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Tiny Pipevine Swallowtail caterpillars on their host plant, Dutchman's Pipe, at Vallejo's Loma Vista Farm. (Photo by Kathy Keatley Garvey)
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Seen Any Pipevine Swallowtails Lately?

May 25th, 2021
Seen any Pipevine Swallowtails lately? The UC Davis Ecological Garden is teeming with eggs, larvae, pupa and adults. The butterflies there seem particularly fond of nectaring on Jupiter's beard, Centranthus ruber.
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