When the week is about butterflies instead of guerrilla attacks, murderous rampages, measles outbreaks, and deflated footballs, it's a good week. Butterflies draw smiles instead of scowls, pleasure instead of pain, glee instead of grief. So, here's Part 1 of the good news.

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A queen black-tailed bumble bee, Bombus melanopygus, foraging on pansies on Jan. 22, 2014. (Photo by Kathy Keatley Garvey)

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Waiting for the Bees

January 22nd, 2015

Where, oh where, is that first bumble bee of the year? It's about this time of the year when the queen black-tailed bumble bee, Bombus melanopygus, and the queen yellow-faced bumble bee, Bombus vosnesenskii, emerge.

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Honey bee foraging in a flowering quince. (Photo by Kathy Keatley Garvey)

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Why Spring Doesn't Seem So Distant

January 21st, 2015

The honey bees are hungry. Those venturing out from their colonies as the temperatures edge toward 55 degrees or more aren't finding much. It's the dead of winter. Spring seems so distant. But wait, the flowering quince is blooming.

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Honey bee foraging on a tulip. (Photo by Kathy Keatley Garvey)

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Marla Spivak's Keynote Speech: 'Helping Bees Stand on Their Own Six Feet'

January 20th, 2015

"Helping Bees Stand on Their Own Six Feet." Yes, honey bees have six feet, and that's the title of a keynote speech to be presented May 9 at the University of California, Davis by Distinguished McKnight Professor and 2010 MacArthur Fellow Marla Spivak of the University of Minnesota.

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This dead honey bee with a load of pollen was among dozens found outside the Robert and Margrit Mondavi Center for the Performing Arts on the UC Davis campus. (Photo by Kathy Keatley Garvey)

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'Super Sleuth' Solves the Mystery of the Dead Bees

January 19th, 2015

What's killing the honey bees? The email arrived in my UC Davis inbox at 9:10 a.m., Thursday, Jan. 8. An employee from the UC Davis Plumbing Shop wondered what was happening in front of the Robert and Margrit Mondavi Center for the Performing Arts on the UC Davis campus.

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