Rangelands

Have you been seeing a lot of defoliated sycamore trees recently? Sparse foliage and early leaf drop on sycamore trees might be due to anthracnose. The cool, wet spring in many parts of California provided the perfect conditions for this disease.

Back in July 2023, we wrote a Bug Squad blog about a feral bee colony inside a cavity of a sycamore tree on the UC Davis campus. The triple-digit temperatures resulted in bee bearding.

Like many of you, I have been a walking sneeze these past couple weeks.

UC Davis distinguished professor Walter Leal is a newly elected trustee of the Royal Entomological Society (RES), the 13-member council that governs the 190-year-old international organization. He is the first UC Davis scientist to be elected a trustee.

An Anise Swallowtail, Papilio zelicaon, settles on a red zinnia in a Vacaville pollinator garden and begins sipping the nectar. A honey bee buzzes by. Was she just passing through or did she want the same nectar? The bee brushes the butterfly's wings. Okay! I'm leaving! Score: Bee, 1; butterfly 0.

It's Labor Day but "The Girls" continue to work. "The Girls" are the honey bees, a great example of a matriarchal society.

The Invasive Pest Spotlight focuses on relevant or emerging invasive species in California. In this issue we are covering brooms, a group of invasive shrubs. Invasive Broom facts Brooms are upright shrubs in the legume family that typically produce small, yellow, pea-shaped flowers.

Let's roll! During the golden hour, right before sunset, have you ever watched a male longhorned bee roll full-barrel over a flower at Top Gun speed? During the day, the male longhorned target assorted insects foraging on "their" patch of flowers.

The magic of a mural! It was quite a celebration during the unveiling of a UC Davis ceramic-mosaic mural, The Secret Life of Vineyards, took place at a Napa Valley organic vineyard.

Congratulations to community ecologist Louie Yang, a UC Davis professor in the Department of Entomology and Nematology and chair of the Entomology Graduate Program, He is one of 33 recipients of the 2023 UC Davis Graduate Program Advising and Mentoring Awards.