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Favoring the Fava Beans
People aren't the only ones favoring fava beans.
Fava beans growing in a raised bed in the Häagen-Dazs Honey Bee Haven on Bee Biology Road, UC Davis, are attracting honey bees, European paper wasps, lacewings, ladybugs, aphids and carpenter bees.
We saw all six insects on a trip to the haven last Friday.
While the honey bees and carpenter bees gathered nectar, the European paper wasps, lacewings and the ladybugs searched for prey. The ladybugs were also searching for mates.
The half-acre bee friendly garden, located next to the Harry H. Laidlaw Jr. Honey Bee Research Facility, west of the central campus, is open year around from dawn to dusk. Admission is free. Visitors can conduct their own self-guided tours by following the signs and reading the plant labels. Groups that want a guided tour (the cost is $4 per person) can contact Christine Casey at cacasey@ucdavis.edu.
Meanwhile, life is good in the fava beans.
A lady beetle, aka ladybug, prowling on a fava bean leaf. (Photo by Kathy Keatley Garvey)
European paper wasp on the hunt. (Photo by Kathy Keatley Garvey)
Honey bee foraging on a fava bean blossom. (Photo by Kathy Keatley Garvey)
Female Valley carpenter bee robbing nectar by slitting the corolla. (Photo by Kathy Keatley Garvey)
Anise Swallowtail: Have You Seen Me?
An anise swallowtail fluttered in and out of the tall anise bordering the banks of the Benicia Marina.
A beautiful sight.
The female butterfly (Papilio zelicaon), as identified by butterfly expert Arthur Shapiro, professor of evolution and ecology at the University of California, Davis, was probably laying eggs, he told us.
The butterfly is often confused with a Western tiger swallowtail (Papilio rutulus). Their coloring does indeed look similar.
As for the anise butterflies, "they have several generations (late February or March-October) and breed very largely on sweet fennel ("anise"), Foeniculum vulgare, and (in the first half of the season) poison hemlock, Conium maculatum," Shapiro writes on his popular website, Art's Butterfly World. "Both of these are naturalized European weeds."
The larvae of the anise swallowtail use fennel as a food plant. Something else about anise: If you crush the leaves, they smell like licorice.
While we were watching the anise swallowtail, something else was watching her: an European paper wasp.
Wasps eat butterfly eggs.
Female anise swallowtail,Papilio zelicaon, as identified by butterfly expert Art Shapiro of UC Davis, visiting anise at the Benicia Marina. (Photo by Kathy Keatley Garvey)
A female anise swallowtail,Papilio zelicaon, touches down on anise at the Benicia Marina. (Photo by Kathy Keatley Garvey)
Up and away--the female anise swallowtail flutters away. (Photo by Kathy Keatley Garvey)
European paper wasp, apparently scouting the anise for butterfly eggs. (Photo by Kathy Keatley Garvey)
Insect Diversity in the Fava Beans
The first day of spring--Tuesday, March 20--yielded a diversity of insects in the fava beans planted in the Häagen-Dazs Honey Bee Haven, a half-acre bee friendly garden adjacent to the Harry H. Laidlaw Jr. Honey Bee Research Facility on Bee Biology Road, University of California,Davis.
A flurry of insects joined the honey bees: ladybugs, a blow fly, a stink bug, an alfalfa butterfly, European paper wasp and scores of aphids.
Fava beans (Vicia faba), one of the world's oldest cultivated crops and native to the Mediterranean region, are also known as broad beans, horse beans, pigeon beans, and the like.
"In North America, Canada is perhaps the largest producer of fava beans since they produce best in cool summer areas," write San Joaquin County Farm Advisors Gary Hickman and Mick Canevari in a Family Farm Series publication of the UC Davis Small Farm Center. "Minnesota and the lake states produce small acreages. In California, fava beans are grown as seed crops along the coast from Lompoc to Salinas and in the Northern Sacramento Valley, but in other areas of the state they are grown mostly as a cover crop or for green manure."
You can learn more about fava beans in the UC Davis Small Farm Center publication. Meanwhile, the insects hanging out in the Häagen-Dazs Honey Bee Haven are definitely favoring the fava beans.
Count the insects! Ladybugs, a European paper wasp, blow fly and aphids are all over the fava beans in the Haagen-Dazs Honey Bee Haven. (Photo by Kathy Keatley Garvey)
European paper wasp and a pair of ladybugs in the Haagen-Dazs Honey Bee Haven. (Photo by Kathy Keatley Garvey)
Stink bug occupies a fava bean leaf. (Photo by Kathy Keatley Garvey)
Honey bee foraging on the fava beans. Note the gray load of pollen.(Photo by Kathy Keatley Garvey)
Hunting for Prey
Be careful when you're harvesting an artichoke.
You might find a European paper wasp (Polistes dominula) hunting for a little protein, such as ants, flies and tiny bees to carry back to its nest.
Entomologist Whitney Cranshaw of Colorado State University writes in one of his fact sheets that "European paper wasps rear their young on live insects. They do not produce nuisance problems around outdoor dining that characterize scavenging species, such as the western yellowjacket. European paper wasps will sometimes feed on sweet materials, including honeydew produced by aphids. On rare occasions, they also may feed and damage ripe fruit."
Don't consider the European paper wasp a pest. "European paper wasps have become one of the most important natural controls of many kinds of yard and garden insects," Cranshaw writes. "Most commonly they feed on caterpillars, including the larvae of hornworms, cabbageworms, and tent caterpillars. Sawfly larvae are also commonly taken prey."
As its name implies, it's a native of Europe. Says Cranshaw: 'The European paper wasp is the common paper wasp of Europe. It was first found in North America in the 1970s in the Boston area. Since then it has spread rapidly to much of the northern half of the United States and British Columbia."
Volunteers at the Häagen-Dazs Honey Bee Haven at the Harry H. Laidlaw Jr. Honey Bee Research Facility, University of California, Davis, recently spotted a paper wasp nest on a lush growth of grey musk sage.
As the paper wasps tended and guarded their nest, honey bees, bumble bees and carpenter bees gathered nectar.
The bees: vegetarians. The wasps: carnivores.
European paper wasp hunting for prey on an artichoke. (Photo by Kathy Keatley Garvey)
European paper wasps guarding a nest. (Photo by Kathy Keatley Garvey)
