Bug Squad

California almond growers are worried--and rightfully so--about the honey bee shortage. Honey bee guru Eric Mussen, Extension apiculturist with the UC Davis Department of Entomology, said today that almond growers may not have enough bees to pollinate this year's crop of 800,000 acres. We need 1.

Ah, what an intoxicating scent! If you've ever been around the winter daphne, Daphne odora, cultivar "Aureomarginata," you know that its aroma precedes it. You'll ask "What's that fragrance?" before you even see the showy pink-and-white blossoms and its green leaves edged in gold.

Of the one millions insects so far described, 120,000 are butterflies or moths, 150,000 are flies, 400,000 are beetles, and only 3000 are walking sticks. Which are my speciality. Not too much is known about walking sticks because not many people have studied them.

When the honey bee meets the flowering quince, the bee is "the belle of the ball." The winter ball. Suddenly the flowering quince (genus Chaenomele) transforms the bleak wintery landscape into a spring ballroom of sorts. The giddy bee is a joy to see.

About those non-social bees... A good place to learn about them is at the UC Davis Department of Entomology seminar on Wednesday, Feb. 6. James Jim Cane, a research entomologist with the U.S.