Mosquito repellent plants are garden heroes: colorful flowers and herbs with natural fragrances that chase away buzzing insects even as their perfumes soothe humans.
The first step in your plan to thwart mosquitoes? Grow plants such as lavender, basil, mint, scented geraniums, and marigolds. But unless you’re planning to plop your chair down in the middle of a flower bed, you may not enjoy the full protective benefits. So we came up with a plan to bring the full power of your anti-mosquito forces to the deck or patio: a mosquito repellent floral arrangement. (We placed ours on a side table next to our favorite reading chair.) Read on for step-by-step instructions.
Lavender’s strong scent, which comes from essential oils that can be distilled from its flowers, is often used for aromatherapy. While there is little scientific evidence to back up claims that lavender oil has health benefits, inhaling its fresh, herbal scent calms many people. But not mosquitoes.
Above: Florists at work.
I asked a couple of aspiring florists named Clementine and Eve to arrange the mosquito repellent plants and flowers in a few clear glass vases: a deconstructed floral arrangement. (If you don’t have vases of different heights and shapes on hand, you can just as easily arrange the flowers in mix-and-match drinking glasses or glass jars to get the same effect.).
Above: Jagged lavender (L. pinnata buchii) with feathery leaves and deeply purple flowers goes into a vase, roots and all.
In a dreary part of downtown Atlanta, shipping containers have been transformed into an oasis for dozens of previously unsheltered people who now proudly call a former parking lot home.
The gated micro community known as “The Melody” doesn’t look like a parking lot anymore. Artificial turf is spread across the asphalt. Potted plants and red Adirondack chairs abound. There’s even a dog park.
The shipping containers have been divided into 40 insulated studio apartments that include a single bed, HVAC unit, desk, microwave, small refrigerator, TV, sink and bathroom. On a recent afternoon, a half-dozen residents were chatting around a table in The Melody’s smoking area.
The gated micro community known as “The Melody” is a housing complex made from shipping containers.
John Bazemore / AP
“I’m just so grateful,” said Cynthia Diamond, a 61-year-old former line cook who uses a wheelchair and used to be chronically homeless. “I have my own door key. I ain’t got to worry about nobody knocking on my door, telling me when to eat, sleep or do anything. I’m going to stay here as long as the Lord allows me to stay here.”
Faced with years of rising homelessness rates and failed solutions, city officials across the U.S. have been embracing rapid housing options emphasizing three factors: small, quick and cheap. Officials believe micro communities, unlike shelters, offer stability that, when combined with wraparound services, can more effectively put residents on the path to secure housing.
Sprouting across nation
Denver has opened three micro communities and converted another five hotels for people who used to be homeless. In Austin, Texas, there are three villages of “tiny homes.” In Los Angeles, a 232-unit complex features two three-floor buildings of stacked shipping containers.
“Housing is a ladder. You start with the very first rung. Folks that are literally sleeping on the ground aren’t even on the first rung,” said Denver Mayor Mike Johnston, sitting in one of the city’s new micro communities that offer tiny, transitional homes for that first rung.
More than 1,500 people have been moved indoors through the program, with over 80% still in the housing as of last month, according to city data. The inexpensive units are particularly a boon for cities with high housing costs, where moving that many people directly into apartments wouldn’t be financially feasible.
Both Atlanta’s and Denver’s program act as a stepping stone as they work to get people jobs and more permanent housing, with Denver aiming to move people out within six months.
That includes Eric Martinez, 28, who has been in limbo between the street and the bottom rung for most of his life. At birth Martinez was flung into the revolving door of foster care, and he’s wrestled with substance use while surfing couches and pitching tents.
Eric Martinez, 28, who has wrestled with substance abuse most of his life, was directed into a micro community after his Denver tent encampment was swept by the city.
Thomas Peipert / AP
“It’s kind of demeaning, it makes me feel less of a person,” said Martinez, his eyes downcast. “I had to get out of it and look out for myself at that point: It’s fight or flight, and I flew.”
Martinez’s Denver tent encampment was swept and he along with the others were directed into the micro communities of small cabin-like structures with a twin bed, desk and closet. The city built three such communities with nearly 160 units total in about six months, at roughly $25,000 per unit, said Johnston. The 1,000 converted hotel units cost about $100,000 each.
On site at the micro community are bathrooms, showers, washing machines, small dog parks and kitchens, though the Salvation Army delivers meals.
The program represents an about-face from policies that for years focused on short-term group shelters and the ceaseless shuffle of encampments from one city block to the next. That system made it difficult to keep people who were scattered through the city connected to services and on the path to permanent housing.
Martinez sits outside his room, one of the micro community’s160 small, cabin-like structures equipped with a twin bed, desk and closet.
Thomas Peipert / AP
Those services in Denver’s and Atlanta’s micro communities are largely centralized. They offer residents case management, counseling, mental health and substance abuse therapy, housing guidance and assistance obtaining anything from vocational skills training to a new pair of dentures.
“We’re able to meet every level of the hierarchy of needs — from security and shelter, all the way up to self-actualization and the sense of community,” said Peter Cumiskey, the Atlanta site clinician.
The Melody, and projects like it, are a “very promising, feasible and cost-effective way” to tackle homelessness, said Michael Rich, an Emory University political science professor who studies housing policy. Rich noted that transitional housing is still just the first step toward permanent housing.
The programs in Denver and Atlanta, taking inspiration from similar ones in cities like Columbia, South Carolina, and Savannah, Georgia, offer a degree of privacy and security not found in congregate shelters or encampments.
Giving each resident their own bathroom and kitchen is a crucial feature that helps set The Melody apart, said Cathryn Vassell, whose nonprofit, Partners For Home, oversees the micro community. Aside from a prohibition on overnight guests, staff emphasize the tenants are treated as independent residents.
Vassell acknowledged it’s unclear how long the containers will last — she’s hoping 20 years. But, she said, they were the right choice for The Melody because they were relatively inexpensive and already had handicap-accessible bathrooms since many were used by Georgia hospitals during the COVID-19 pandemic.
The project, which took only about four months to complete, cost about $125,000 per unit — not “tremendously inexpensive,” Vassell said, but less than traditional construction, and much quicker. Staffing and security operations cost about $900,000 a year.
City officials look to expand rapid housing
The Melody is the first part of Atlanta Mayor Andre Dickens’ target of supplying 500 units of rapid housing on city-owned land by December 2025. A 2023 “point-in-time” count found there were 738 unsheltered people in Atlanta, far fewer than many cities, but still an increase over the previous year.
“We need more Melodies as fast as possible,” said Courtney English, the mayor’s chief policy officer.
Few objected when The Melody was announced last year, but as city officials seek to expand the rapid-housing footprint, they know local pushback is likely. That’s what Denver faced.
Mayor Johnston said he attended at least 60 town halls in six months as Denver tried to identify locations for the new communities and faced pushback from local residents worried about trash and safety.
“What they are worried about is their current experience of unsheltered homelessness,” Johnston said. “We had to get them to see not the world as it used to exist, but the world as it could exist, and now we have the proof points of what that could be.”
Prepped for a move at a moment’s notice
The scars of life on the street still stick with Martinez. All his belongings are prepped for a move at a moment’s notice, even though he feels secure in his tiny home alongside his cat, Appa.
The community has been “very uplifting and supporting,” he said, pausing. “You don’t get that a lot.”
On his wall is a calendar with a job orientation penciled in. The next step is working with staff to get a housing voucher for an apartment.
“I’m always looking down on myself for some reason,” he said. But “I feel like I’ve been doing a pretty good job. Everyone is pretty proud of me.”
Above: A tick when it’s at nymph stage is teeny-tiny. Photograph by R. Kriatyrr Brosvik via Flickr.
Your most essential line of defense is to check your body every day for ticks, both after gardening and before going to bed. The Wilderness Medical Society recommends that you remove all your clothing and “systematically scan the body for ticks, paying special attention to warm places (armpits, knees, under underwear, around the hairline of neck, ears, and navel).”
Spray insect repellent on exposed skin.
Use bug spray with an E.P.A.-registered product that contains Picaridin or Deet. “Natural” bug sprays might also work, but the CDC notes the efficacy of “natural” ingredients varies wildly, and “moreover, different products based on the same active ingredients (e.g., rosemary and peppermint oils) can have highly variable tick killing efficacy, underscoring the difficulty in making recommendations about unregulated minimum-risk products based solely on the active ingredients they contain.”
Treat your gardening clothes, too.
Another tactic is to spray your gardening clothing with the insecticide permethrin; available as a spray-on treatment, permethrin usually lasts through several washings but needs to be reapplied with some frequency. Zinzi Edmundson, the founder of Treehouse newsletter, who gardens in Maine, suggests spraying your shoes, especially (she uses Sawyer’s permethrin). If you’re unsure about adding permethrin yourself, you can mail your gardening clothes to Insect Shield for professional application, which is supposed to last five times longer.
Wear all white.
You’re familiar with the drill: Light colored clothes make it easier to see ticks. In her Quick Takes interview, Deborah Needleman shared her go-to white garden uniform: A pair of white Dickies or Carhartt pants, a white Hanes Re/done t-shirt, and white slip-on Vans. You could also consider the TickSuit, a full-body white cotton jumpsuit (with hood!) developed by a doctor who had Lyme disease four times.
We’ve all also heard the advice to tuck your pants into your socks, but too often gardeners skip this step. Connecticut Agricultural Experiment Station’s Tick Management Handbook (an excellent resource) notes that “surveys show the majority of individuals never tuck their pants into their socks when entering tick-infested areas.” You should also tuck your shirt into your pants, so ticks can’t sneak in at the waistband.
Roll the tape.
For an extra layer of protection, my pal Laura Serino, who lives on North Haven in Maine, where ticks are serious business, came through with two ingenious suggestions. Wrap a ring of double stick tape around your sock-covered ankles to prevent ticks from crawling up your leg. Then when you get inside, use a sticky lint roller to go over all your clothing to (hopefully) remove ticks, including the nymphs which are so hard to see.
Shower after gardening.
Don’t wait to hop in the shower. Make it a habit to rinse off as soon as you get inside.
Launder right away.
To make sure you’re not bringing ticks into your home, put your gardening clothes directly into the washing machine (don’t get a snack or a glass of water first!). Always wash on hot and then dry on high heat, as well. According to the authors of the Connecticut Agricultural Experiment Station’s Tick Management Handbook, “Many blacklegged ticks and lone star ticks can survive a warm or hot water wash, but they cannot withstand one hour in a hot dryer.”
Joro spiders are an invasive species that arrived in Georgia more than a decade ago, and now experts say they’re creeping, crawling and apparently parachuting their way into the Northeast.
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With rich reds, gentle greens and basic blacks, Nature’s screaming, crawling artwork is the epitome of rare beauty — at least in the eyes of some beholders. To others, it may seem just creepy.
It’s a colorful, ever-changing canvas of bugs. Lots of them.
A once-in-221-year convergence of two broods of periodical cicadas are emerging at the same time. The big effect of the cicadas is the sheer numbers. Trillions are expected to populate 16 states by mid to late June. They can be overwhelming, messy and loud.
But individually, up close and personal, a cicada has splashes of color, subtle shapes and that special something that some scientists and artists say translate to beauty. Even if to the average person it’s just a bug.
To artists and scientists, cicadas are more awe-inspiring than awful.
Periodical cicadas are “more otherworldly-looking” than other insects and then the fact they come out every 13 or 17 years adds to their allure, making “them feel like something out of a science fiction movie,” said Jonathan Monaghan, a Washington, D.C.-based visual artist.
“Up close, there is a subtle beauty, particularly with their vibrant cadmium red eyes,” Monaghan said in an email. “Visually, they are at their best freshly molted because there is more contrast on their bodies, showing off some really interesting patterns. Overall though, I still think they are rather goofy looking.”
When collage artist Luis Martin, a self-described art engineer in Brooklyn, first saw cicadas, he was entranced.
“They were just so beautiful and diaphanous that I kind of fell in love,” said Martin, who sported a cicada bolo tie during a Zoom interview. “It looked like a fairy.”
But it’s a love/fear kind of thing. They also seem scary, he said.
“It kind of goes back to these beautiful colors that we tend to think is kind of ugly, right? Because they’re brown, they’re kind of metallic, kind of like alien,” Martin said. “As a brown person myself I find them absolutely beautiful. I can totally see myself in them.”
Not just himself, but Frida Kahlo, Martin said. He could see the artist’s signature eyebrows in the close-up cicada face images.
Scientists are even more mesmerized.
“There’s a lot of things in the world today to get freaked out about. Cicadas aren’t one of them,” said Mount St. Joseph University biologist Gene Kritsky, who wrote a book on this year’s dual emergence. “They’re beautiful insects. They’ve got these red eyes, black bodies, orange-colored veins on these membranous wings. I love the way they come up in these big numbers. I like that I can predict when they come out. It’s a scientific experiment every time.
“But what I really like about them, they got me tenure.”
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Would you eat a cicada salad? The monstrous little noisemakers descend on a New Orleans menu
Updated: 3:09 PM PDT May 1, 2024
As the nation prepares for trillions of red-eyed bugs known as periodical cicadas to emerge, it’s worth noting that they’re not just annoying, noisy pests — if prepared properly, they can also be tasty to eat. Blocks away from such French Quarter fine-dining stalwarts as Antoine’s and Brennan’s, the Audubon Insectarium in New Orleans has long served up an array of alternative, insect-based treats at its “Bug Appetit” cafe overlooking the Mississippi River. “Cinnamon Bug Crunch,” chili-fried waxworms, and crispy, cajun-spiced crickets are among the menu items.Video above: Get a look at some of the menu items and hear from the “bug chef.”Periodical cicadas stay buried for years, until they surface and take over a landscape. Depending on the variety, the emergence happens every 13 or 17 years. This year two groups are expected to emerge soon, averaging around 1 million per acre over hundreds of millions of acres across parts of 16 states in the Midwest and South.They emerge when the ground warms to 64 degrees, which is happening earlier than it used to because of climate change, entomologists said. The bugs are brown at first but darken as they mature.Recently, Zack Lemann, the Insectarium’s curator of animal collections, has been working up cicada dishes that may become part of the menu. He donned a chef’s smock this week to show a couple of them off, including a green salad with apple, almonds, blueberry vinaigrette — and roasted cicadas. Fried cicada nymphs were dressed on top with a warm mixture of creole mustard and soy sauce.”I do dragonflies in a similar manner,” Lemann said as he used tweezers to plop nymphs into a container of flour before cooking them in hot oil. Depending on the type and the way they are prepared, cooked cicadas taste similar to toasted seeds or nuts. The Insectarium isn’t the first to promote the idea of eating them. Over the years, they have appeared on a smattering of menus and in cookbooks, including titles like “Cicada-Licious” from the University of Maryland in 2004.”Every culture has things that they love to eat and, maybe, things that are taboo or things that people just sort of, wrinkle their nose and frown their brow at,” Lemann said. “And there’s no reason to do that with insects when you look at the nutritional value, their quality on the plate, how they taste, the environmental benefits of harvesting insects instead of dealing with livestock.”Lemann has been working to make sure the Bug Appetit cafe has legal clearance to serve wild-caught cicadas while he works on lining up sources for the bugs. He expects this spring’s unusual emergence of two huge broods of cicadas to heighten interest in insects in general, and in the Insectarium — even though the affected area doesn’t include southeast Louisiana.”I can’t imagine, given the fact that periodical cicadas are national news, that we won’t have guests both local and from outside New Orleans, asking us about that,” said Lemann. “Which is another reason I hope to have enough to serve it at least a few times to people.”
Blocks away from such French Quarter fine-dining stalwarts as Antoine’s and Brennan’s, the Audubon Insectarium in New Orleans has long served up an array of alternative, insect-based treats at its “Bug Appetit” cafe overlooking the Mississippi River. “Cinnamon Bug Crunch,” chili-fried waxworms, and crispy, cajun-spiced crickets are among the menu items.
Video above: Get a look at some of the menu items and hear from the “bug chef.”
Periodical cicadas stay buried for years, until they surface and take over a landscape. Depending on the variety, the emergence happens every 13 or 17 years. This year two groups are expected to emerge soon, averaging around 1 million per acre over hundreds of millions of acres across parts of 16 states in the Midwest and South.
They emerge when the ground warms to 64 degrees, which is happening earlier than it used to because of climate change, entomologists said. The bugs are brown at first but darken as they mature.
Recently, Zack Lemann, the Insectarium’s curator of animal collections, has been working up cicada dishes that may become part of the menu. He donned a chef’s smock this week to show a couple of them off, including a green salad with apple, almonds, blueberry vinaigrette — and roasted cicadas. Fried cicada nymphs were dressed on top with a warm mixture of creole mustard and soy sauce.
“I do dragonflies in a similar manner,” Lemann said as he used tweezers to plop nymphs into a container of flour before cooking them in hot oil.
Depending on the type and the way they are prepared, cooked cicadas taste similar to toasted seeds or nuts. The Insectarium isn’t the first to promote the idea of eating them. Over the years, they have appeared on a smattering of menus and in cookbooks, including titles like “Cicada-Licious” from the University of Maryland in 2004.
“Every culture has things that they love to eat and, maybe, things that are taboo or things that people just sort of, wrinkle their nose and frown their brow at,” Lemann said. “And there’s no reason to do that with insects when you look at the nutritional value, their quality on the plate, how they taste, the environmental benefits of harvesting insects instead of dealing with livestock.”
Lemann has been working to make sure the Bug Appetit cafe has legal clearance to serve wild-caught cicadas while he works on lining up sources for the bugs. He expects this spring’s unusual emergence of two huge broods of cicadas to heighten interest in insects in general, and in the Insectarium — even though the affected area doesn’t include southeast Louisiana.
“I can’t imagine, given the fact that periodical cicadas are national news, that we won’t have guests both local and from outside New Orleans, asking us about that,” said Lemann. “Which is another reason I hope to have enough to serve it at least a few times to people.”
Trillions of evolution’s bizarro wonders, red-eyed periodical cicadas that have pumps in their heads and jet-like muscles in their rears, are about to emerge in numbers not seen in decades and possibly centuries.
Crawling out from underground every 13 or 17 years, with a collective song as loud as jet engines, the periodical cicadas are nature’s kings of the calendar.
These black bugs with bulging eyes differ from their greener-tinged cousins that come out annually. They stay buried year after year, until they surface and take over a landscape, covering houses with shed exoskeletons and making the ground crunchy.
This spring, an unusual cicada double dose is about to invade a couple parts of the United States in what University of Connecticut cicada expert John Cooley called “cicada-geddon.” The last time these two broods came out together in 1803 Thomas Jefferson, who wrote about cicadas in his Garden Book but mistakenly called them locusts, was president.
“Periodic cicadas don’t do subtle,” Cooley said.
Dog-day cicada (Tibicen canicularis) in Toronto, Ontario, Canada, on August 21, 2022.
Creative Touch Imaging Ltd./NurPhoto via Getty Images
If you’re fascinated by the upcoming solar eclipse, the cicadas are weirder and bigger, said Georgia Tech biophysicist Saad Bhamla.
“We’ve got trillions of these amazing living organisms come out of the Earth, climb up on trees and it’s just a unique experience, a sight to behold,” Bhamla said. “It’s like an entire alien species living underneath our feet and then some prime number years they come out to say hello.”
At times mistaken for voracious and unrelated locusts, periodical cicadas are more annoying rather than causing biblical economic damage. They can hurt young trees and some fruit crops, but it’s not widespread and can be prevented.
Two broods add up to a “mass invasion”: 1 million per acre
The largest geographic brood in the nation — called Brood XIX and coming out every 13 years — is about to march through the Southeast, having already created countless boreholes in the red Georgia clay. It’s a sure sign of the coming cicada occupation. They emerge when the ground warms to 64 degrees (17.8 degrees Celsius), which is happening earlier than it used to because of climate change, entomologists said. The bugs are brown at first but darken as they mature.
Soon after the insects appear in large numbers in Georgia and the rest of the Southeast, cicada cousins that come out every 17 years will inundate Illinois. They are Brood XIII.
“You’ve got one very widely distributed brood in Brood XIX, but you have a very dense historically abundant brood in the Midwest, your Brood XIII,” said University of Maryland entomologist Mike Raupp.
“And when you put those two together… you would have more than anywhere else any other time,” University of Maryland entomologist Paula Shrewsbury said.
These hideaway cicadas are found only in the eastern United States and a few tiny other places. There are 15 different broods that come out every few years, on 17- and 13-year cycles. These two broods may actually overlap — but probably not interbreed — in a small area near central Illinois, entomologists said.
“It’s going to be this mass invasion, but a peaceful one,” said Allen Lawrence, associate curator of entomology at the Peggy Notebaert Nature Museum.
The numbers that will come out this year — averaging around 1 million per acre over hundreds of millions of acres across 16 states — are mind-boggling. Easily hundreds of trillions, maybe quadrillions, Cooley said.
An even bigger adjacent joint emergence will be when the two largest broods, XIX and XIV, come out together in 2076, Cooley said: “That is the cicada-palooza.”
The origin of some of the astronomical cicada numbers can likely be traced to evolution, Cooley and several other entomologists said. Fat, slow and tasty, periodical cicadas make ideal meals for birds, said Raupp, who eats them himself. (His school put out a cicada cookbook called “Cicada-Licious.” ) But there are too many for them to be eaten to extinction, he said.
“Birds everywhere will feast. Their bellies will be full and once again the cicadas will emerge triumphant,” Raupp said.
“They are not toxic to pets. They won’t sting or bite your pet,” said Dr. Cynthia Gonzalez of Family Pet Animal Hospital in Chicago’s Lincoln Park neighborhood. “The only issue that would present for your pet is if they were to ingest a large amount of them, or if they’re a smaller dog if they ate a small piece of the exoskeleton — sometimes that can really irritate their GI tract.”
“Sometimes, in rare instances, an animal may have an allergic reaction to some of the components in that exoskeleton if that pet is also allergic to shellfish,” said Dr. Kelly Cairns DVM, MS, DACVIM — a board-certified small animal internal medicine specialist, vice president of medical excellence and education for Thrive Pet Healthcare, and secretary of the board of directors of the Chicago Veterinary Medical Association.
Prime numbers and an evolutionary trick
The other way cicadas use numbers, or math, is in their cycles. They stay underground either 13 or 17 years, both prime numbers. Those big and odd numbers are likely an evolutionary trick to keep predators from relying on a predictable emergence.
The cicadas can cause problems for young trees and nurseries when their mating and nesting weighs down and breaks branches, Shrewsbury said.
Periodical cicadas look for vegetation surrounding mature trees, where they can mate and lay eggs and then go underground to feast on the roots, said Mount St. Joseph University biologist Gene Kritsky, a cicada expert who wrote a book on this year’s dual emergence. That makes American suburbia “periodical cicada heaven,” he said.
It can be hard on the eardrums when all those cicadas get together in those trees and start chorusing. It’s like a singles bar with the males singing to attract mates, with each species having its own mating call.
“The whole tree is screaming,” said Kritsky, who created a Cicada Safari app to track where the cicadas are.
Cooley takes hearing protection because it can get so intense.
“It’s up in the 110 decibel range,” Cooley said. “It’d be like putting your head next to a jet. It is painful.”
The courtship is something to watch, Kritsky imitated the male singing “ffaairro (his pitch rising), ffaairro.”
“She flicks her wings,” Kritsky narrated in a play-by-play. “He moves closer. He sings. She flicks her wings. When he gets really close, he doesn’t have a gap, he’ll go ffaairro, ffaairro, ffaairro, fffaairo.”
Then the mating is consummated, with the female laying eggs in a groove in a tree branch. The cicada nymph will fall to the ground, then dig underground to get to the roots of a tree.
Cicadas are strange in that they feed on the tree’s xylem, which carry water and some nutrients. The pressure inside the xylem is lower than outside, but a pump in the cicada’s head allows the bug to get fluid that it otherwise wouldn’t be able to get out of the tree, said Carrie Deans, a University of Alabama Huntsville entomologist.
The cicada gets so much fluid that it has a lot of liquid waste to get rid of. It does so thanks to a special muscle that creates a jet of urine that flows faster than in most any other animal, said Georgia Tech’s Bhamla.
In Macon, Georgia, T.J. Rauls was planting roses and holly this week when he came across a cicada while digging. A neighbor had already posted an image of an early-emerging critter.
Rauls named his own bug “Bobby” and said he’s looking forward to more to come.
“I think it will be an exciting thing,” Rauls said. “It will be bewildering with all their noises.”
Champions of organic farming have long portrayed it as friendlier to humans and the earth. But a new study in a California county found a surprising effect as their acreage grew: Nearby conventional farms applied more pesticides, likely to stay on top of an increased insect threat to their crops, the researchers said.
Ashley Larsen, lead author of the study in this week’s journal Science, said understanding what’s happening could be important to keeping organic and conventional farmers from hurting each other’s operations.
“We expect an increase in organic in the future. How do we make sure this is not causing unintended harm?” asked Larsen, an associate professor at the University of California, Santa Barbara.
By contrast, the researchers found that when organic farms were surrounded by other organic fields, their pesticide use dropped, which the team thinks may be due to their shared reliance on bugs that are natural enemies of agricultural pests. Organic farms are allowed to use certain approved pesticides, but often turn first to “good bugs” that prey on the pests. “It seems that spatially clustering or concentrating organic fields could provide that benefit or that solution,” Larsen said.
The researchers analyzed 14,000 fields in California’s Kern County over a seven-year period.
Organic farm acreage has been trending upward since 2000, though it still accounts for less than 1% of all farmland, according to the USDA. As that change occurs, Larsen and her team say keeping organic and conventional farms sufficiently separate could benefit both.
But many farmers, both conventional and organic, balk at the idea of policies that might restrict where different methods can be used. And some outside researchers said more study was needed before contemplating policy recommendations. They noted that the study didn’t measure the kind or number of insects on the different farms, meaning the increased pesticide use may have been just a precaution.
Still, the “impressive data set” makes the study useful in generating worthwhile questions about farming practices and pesticides, said Christian Krupke, who studies insects as a professor of entomology at Purdue University and was not involved in the study. The overall number of insects is going down, a phenomenon some scientists have called the “ insect apocalypse,” but pesticide use is not decreasing, he said.
Krupke said the research shows how conventional farmers treat nearby organic operations “as this focal point of potential outbreaks.”
David Haviland, an entomologist with the University of California also not involved with the study, agreed. He described the fight in Kern County to control the glassy-winged sharpshooter, which infests citrus orchards and can introduce devastating plant diseases into grapes, almonds and some other crops. Haviland said that regional maps clearly showcase organic farms as “these big, incredible hot spots where there’s massive numbers of this pest.” Conventional growers next door have to increase their pesticide use as a result, he said.
Yichao Rui, an agroecologist at Purdue, said that kind of response by farmers isn’t always due to an actual increase in pests; sometimes, it’s just for “peace of mind.” And Katy Rogers, who manages an organic farm outside Indianapolis, said that in many cases it’s a misconception that organic farmers are harboring massive pest infestations.
“We’re not fostering populations of detrimental insects on most organic farms, on a well-managed farm,” she said. “We are simply battling them with other tools first. Because the bad bugs would still destroy my crop.”
Rui said investigating the environmental consequences of organic farming is a worthy goal, and both organic and conventional farms have room for improvement. But he thinks looking only at at pesticide use doesn’t account for factors like human health, air and water quality and ecosystem diversity that can be affected by different farming methods.
“We need to have a holistic … assessment of the benefits and tradeoffs of all of these agricultural practices,” he said.
Brad Wetli, an Indiana farmer who farms grain conventionally, said that he hasn’t noticed any changes in his pest control situation since his neighbor switched to organic four years ago. He thinks that farmers may be quicker to apply more pesticides to high-value crops like the fruits, vegetables and nuts in California, whereas the row crops he grows like corn and beans aren’t worth as much per acre, so it would take a bigger change in the number of insects he saw on his farm before reaching for more spray.
Wetli was more concerned with soil management. He’s careful to plant cover crops and has worked to reduce tilling, which can cause soil erosion and contaminate waterways, and said organic farming sometimes still involves tilling.
Meanwhile, organic farmers expressed concern that the study addresses the effects of organic farms on conventional ones but not the other way around. For example, they can lose their certification for up to three years if a prohibited material is applied on their fields, even if by accident, according to the USDA.
Walter Goldstein, a corn breeder in Wisconsin who produces both organic and non-organic seed, grew up working on an organic farm amid conventional ones and still remembers pesticide drift.
“There’s just these really weird smells,” he said. “Chemical smells. They smell like factory stuff.”
Jay Shipman, who owns an organic farm in Kern County near another large organic farm, said that he likes farming next to someone with similar practices “not just because it’s economics,” he said, but because “this is how I eat. This is how I want my family eating.” He added, however, that he grew up in conventional agriculture and understands that trying to convince farmers they should do something differently can be “tough to change, tough to swallow.”
Rogers, the Indianapolis organic farm manager, spent much of her life in conventional agriculture and says she was taught that organic farmers were “enemies.” She’s now deeply committed to a small church-run organic and regenerative farm with vegetables, beehives and hay.
Rogers said she can see benefits from clustering organic farms together, but thinks dividing organic and conventional farmers as the researchers suggested could be “even more polarizing.”
“At the deepest level, we’re all stewarding land and we all actually want to contribute,” she said.
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Follow Melina Walling on X: @MelinaWalling.
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Spring is in the air, and for many gardeners, that means it’s time to start cleaning up the yard. But what if I told you that your garden beds will be better off with a little mess?
Leaving the leaves is not just for fall. Here are seven critical reasons to keep them on your garden beds as winter turns into spring, and spring into summer.
1. Protects good bugs.
Above: Leaf litter provides shelter and nutrients to beneficial insects like centipedes and millipedes. Photograph by Jim Powell for Gardenista, from 10 Essential Insects You Need in the Garden.
Leaves provide a vital habitat for pollinators like butterflies, moths, and native bees as well as other beneficial insects. All of them need a place to overwinter. They all come out of diapause (bug hibernation) at different times between March and May. Removing the leaves too early means you’re throwing out Luna moths, red-banded hairstreak butterflies, and leaf cutter, miner, and mason bees.
2. Provides free mulch.
No need to buy mulch. Leaves keep moisture in and weeds out just as well as wood mulch.
3. Builds healthy soil.
Above: Mulched leaves in a vegetable garden. Photograph by Sheila Brown via Flickr.
Leaves decompose over the course of the year and by doing so, they provide the trees exactly what they need in the way of nutrients…since they came from the tree. And when leaves break down in garden beds, they add to the soil structure that keeps your soil, and by extension, your plants happy.
4. Reduces pest issues.
No pesticides necessary when you leave the leaves, thus providing a home for beneficial insects that eat mosquitoes and other garden pests, such as dragonflies and crane flies. Native insects also attract birds and bats that eat mosquitoes. And leaf litter is a draw as well for opossums that love to eat ticks.
5. Decreases your carbon footprint:
Above: Fallen leaves gathered from the yard and placed in a garden bed. Photograph by jacki-dee via Flickr.
The methods by which many homeowners remove leaves from their property are often not very eco-friendly: Using a leaf blower contributes to greenhouse gases and noise pollution, and harms the topsoil as well. And if the leaves are placed in garbage bag and sent to the landfill, the leaves decompose without oxygen, producing methane gas. When you rake the leaves into your garden beds, the only energy you’re using is your own.
6. Contributes to a balanced ecosystem:
Above: Snowdrops love damp-ish conditions, and fallen leaves are great at locking in moisture. Photograph by Britt Willoughby Dyer, from Gardening 101: Snowdrops.
Leaves are not trash. They are an integral part of your ecosystem. They provide food, shelter, and nutrients. Your garden is not just a bunch of plants but an interconnected system in which all parts are equally important for its health. For instance, caterpillars are the only thing most baby songbirds eat. Keeping the leaves helps caterpillars thrive, which in turn helps birds in the spring.
Ah, the perks of an indoor garden in winter: Fruit, flowers, fragrance, and…fungus gnats? If you are the parent of any indoor plant, the chances are good that you have already met fungus gnats. These small flies are non-buzzing and non-biting, but an annoyance in large numbers because they are attracted to moisture, even if is from your breath, or around your eyes. Swat, swat. Worse, if you do see a lot of the tiny, winged varmints, it means that their even tinier but much hungrier larvae are living in your pots, eating organic matter that includes the roots of your plants, which they damage.
Getting rid of fungus gnats is a three-step process. This is what has worked for me.
Fungus gnats are a warning sign: They thrive in moist environments, and their presence indicates you might be overwatering your plants. Long-term, this can lead to their slow death. So take the gnats’ presence as a helpful hint, and then banish them. While the adults do not feed on anything, they do lay eggs. And it is their larvae that do the quiet, subterranean damage.
Above: Adult fungus gnats, trapped.
Where do fungus gnats come from? Like scale insects indoors, they seem to materialize from the ether. A possible source of fungus gnats in your home is the new plant you just bought, whether it’s a seasonal poinsettia, Christmas amaryllis, or your kitty’s fresh wheatgrass from the pe(s)t store. The insects are a common pest in professional greenhouses. Because new plants might be carriers of fungus gnats, if it is practical, keep them apart from your established, unaffected plants for a period of three weeks. (The four-stage fungus gnat life cycle is about three weeks, from egg, to larva, to pupa, to adult fly.)
They could also be present in your growing media, in egg or larval form. Most potting mixes are sterilized, but it’s hard to know for sure.
Above: The pros and cons of indoor growing—fruit, and pesky critter control.
Here are the three steps to getting rid of fungus gnats.
Step 1: Do not overwater.
Above: I water my plants when the meter reaches the red zone.
This is a permanent care-protocol in eliminating fungus gnats: Only water your plants (deeply) when they have come close to drying out. I have been an indoor grower now for over a decade and you’d think I’d know better, but I am still prone to overwatering. A moisture meter’s long probe is able to give me a better sense of what is happening in the soil, not just in the top inch or so.
Allowing your pots to dry between waterings helps prevent a fungus gnat infestation, and it also keep your plants healthier: Root rot is caused by overwatering and can be fatal. It’s hard to turn that around, so the pesky gnats are the canary in the coal mine for indoor growers. Unlike the poor canary that keels over in bad air, they thrive in the unhealthy environment.
Step 2: Use yellow sticky traps.
Above: Ugh, but excellent. Forty-eight (cute) yellow sticky traps are $6.98 on Amazon.
Adult fungus gnats are attracted to yellow. Place sticky yellow traps in your pots. The traps effectively sequester the adult gnats, interrupting their relentless life cycle by preventing them from laying eggs in your soil. I choose traps that are the least offensive aesthetically (pretty shapes!) and change them when I can’t stand seeing the bodies pile up. Aside from catching the bugs, the traps are a good indicator of infestation, even when you have controlled the problem. I keep them to warn me of potential fungus gnat re-emergence.
Five new spooky-looking species of millipede have been discovered, one of which belongs to a totally unknown group of critters.
The new species, which resemble something out of a sci-fi movie, were found in the forest litter of Tanzania’s remote Udzungwa Mountains, according to a new paper in the European Journal of Taxonomy.
“We record millipedes of all sizes during our fieldwork to measure forest recovery because they are great indicators of forest health, but we didn’t realize the significance of these species until the myriapodologists had assessed our specimens,” Andy Marshall, a professor of tropical forest conservation at the University of the Sunshine Coast, and discoverer of the new species, said in a statement.
“It’s remarkable that so many of these new species did not appear in earlier collecting of millipedes from the same area, but we were still hoping for something new.”
The heads of two of the new millipede species, Lophostreptus magombera and Udzungwastreptus marianae. These new species, alongside three others, were discovered in a forest in Tanzania. The heads of two of the new millipede species, Lophostreptus magombera and Udzungwastreptus marianae. These new species, alongside three others, were discovered in a forest in Tanzania. Credit: European Journal of Taxonomy 2024. DOI: 10.5852/ejt.2024.918.2405
Millipedes are actually not insects, but something called diplopods, and are defined by their elongated bodies and plentiful legs. Despite the name millipede translating roughly to “thousand feet,” no species was known to have over 1,000 legs until 2020, when a species named Eumillipes persephone was found to have up to 1,300 legs.
Most millipedes are fairly small, but the largest species of millipede, found in Africa, can grow as large as 13.8 inches long. These new species were much smaller than this, at only around an inch long, and had 200 or so legs each.
The five new species were named Lophostreptus magombera; Attemsostreptus cataractae; Attemsostreptus leptoptilos; Attemsostreptus julostriatus and Udzungwastreptus marianae, the latter of which was part of a whole new genus: Udzungwastreptus.
This discovery was made during an expedition meant to examine how forests in the area were being affected by logging and other disturbances, and how woody vines may be taking over the region, driven by warmer temperatures.
“The millipedes will help us to determine two very different theories on the role of vines on forest recovery—whether the vines are like bandages protecting a wound or ‘parasitoids’ choking the forest,” Marshall said.
Box of sample millipedes collected by UniSC FoRCE project researchers in Tanzania. Some of these species have never before been seen. Box of sample millipedes collected by UniSC FoRCE project researchers in Tanzania. Some of these species have never before been seen. A.R. Marshall
The new millipede specimens have been taken to Denmark’s Natural History Museum at the University of Copenhagen. This is not the first time that Marshall has discovered a new species, having already been responsible for uncovering a new species of chameleon, and a new species of tree.
These discoveries, including the millipedes, are hoped to highlight the sheer amount of undiscovered diversity lurking in forests around the world.
He said unearthing the new genus and species of millipedes highlighted the huge amount of discovery remaining in tropical forests.
Do you have a tip on a science story that Newsweek should be covering? Do you have a question about millipedes? Let us know via science@newsweek.com.
Uncommon Knowledge
Newsweek is committed to challenging conventional wisdom and finding connections in the search for common ground.
Newsweek is committed to challenging conventional wisdom and finding connections in the search for common ground.
Every so often a DIY project comes across our Instagram feed that stops us in our tracks–as was the case when Omved Gardens shared a video tutorial on building a “bug snug” for hibernating insects. Here was a truly easy to do-it-yourself project that uses materials gardeners likely have on hand (sticks and twine) and solves a common problem (what to do with extra cuttings and slow-to-compost twigs), all while supporting wildlife. We bookmarked it straightaway, but what was even more intriguing was that within a few weeks, we saw other gardeners recreating the bug snug or reposting OmVed’s video on their own feed: This humble garden DIY had gone about as viral as a garden post could go.
Founded in 2017 on a formally tarmacked piece of land in north London’s Highgate Village, Omved Gardens is an educational garden and community space with a focus on biodiversity and permaculture. John Gaffney, the landscape gardener at Omved, says inspiration for the bug snug came from a visit to the Royal Horticultural Society’s Wisley Garden last fall. “When leaving the gardens I noticed these pyramidal structures dotted around the car park,” says Gaffney. “There were signs posted explaining the purpose of these interesting structures and how they were made.” The towers of sticks support insects and invertebrates by providing a safe place to hibernate, and the hollow stems of dead plants, in particular, make excellent little hideaways.
So when Gaffney was left with piles of sticks and hollow stems after preparing Omved’s wildflower beds for winter, he decided to make a smaller-scale version of the pyramids he’d seen at Wisley. “As gardeners, it’s very easy to want to get in the garden and clean up all the mess and the cuttings off the floor. But actually what wildlife wants is a bit of mess,” Gaffney says.And not only are the structures functional and attractive, he notes, they have made for great conversation starters about how to “prepare” for winter and the need to leave a bit of untidiness around for wildlife.
Here’s how to create your own bug snug.
Photography by Will Hearle, courtesy of OmVed Gardens, unless otherwise noted.
Step 1: Build the frame.
Above: Gaffney demonstrates how to create the frame for the bug snug. Stills from video by Will Hearle for OmVed Gardens.
Choose a position for your snug in a sunny spot if possible. Gather three sturdy wood poles of equal length; Gaffney used hazel, but says you can use any straight pieces of wood, including bamboo canes. You can make your snug any size (OmVed’s snugs stand about chest high). Gaffney tied the poles together informally; if you want to get fancy, you can use a clove hitch to create a proper tripod lashing. Once you’ve secured the poles, they should stand up by themselves, but you can knock them into the ground with a hammer or mallet to make the pyramid more secure.
If you’re looking for a light-hearted giggle, make a beeline for this hive of bee puns and bee jokes!
I’ve rounded up my favourite bee puns and bee jokes to make you smile. They’re great bee humour for school projects, greetings card messages, photo captions, or just a bit of fun!
Fun bee jokes
Here are some of my favourite funny bee jokes (or should that be honey bee jokes!?) to get you buzzing.
Why do bees hum? Because they can’t remember the words.
What did the bee say to the flower? Hey bud!
What do you call a bee thats returned from the dead? A zombee.
Which bee gives you a second chance? The plan bee.
What’s another name for a wasp? A wanna-bee.
I went to the bee keepers to buy some bees. All the bees had price tags on them except one. It was a freebie.
What did the bee say to the naughty bee? Bee-hive yourself.
What do bees chew? Bumble gum.
Which singers do bees love? Sting, Bee-yonce and the Bee Gees.
What do bees do when their friend moves into a new hive? They throw them a house swarming party.
What do you call a bee who is having a bad hair day? A Frizz-bee.
What’s black and yellow and flies at 30,000 feet? A bee on an aeroplane.
What do you call a bee that’s been put under a spell? Bee-witched.
Which sport do bees like the most? Rug-bee.
What do you call a Bee that works for the government? A pollentician.
What do you call a bumble bee trying to make up its mind? A maybee.
I’m holding a bee in my hands- what is in my eye? Beauty.
What’s another name for a baby bee? A little humbug.
Who says “zzub zzub zzub”? A bee flying backwards.
What do you call a bee that’s hard to understand? A mumble-bee.
A few more funny bee jokes for kids
What’s a bee’s favourite sport? Rug-bee.
A bumblebee, a spelling bee and a vitamin B got in a fight. The vitamin B1.
What do you get if you cross a horse with a bee? Neigh buzz.
Why are bees good at job interviews? Because they know all of the buzz-words.
What kind of bee hums and drop things? A fumble bee.
What’s a honey bee’s favourite kind of flower? A Bee-gonia.
How does a queen bee get around her hive? She’s throne.
What would bears be without bees? Just ears.
What do you call a beehive with no exits? Unbelievable.
Where did Noah keep his bees? In the ark hives.
What do you call a bee that falls down a hill? A stumble bee.
The best bee puns
There’s certainly no shortage of funny bee puns! Here are some of my favourite puns about bees.
As luck would hive it
Be on your best beehive-iour
‘Swarm today, isn’t it?
Bee-witched
Hive it your way
We bee-long together
Bee mine
I’ll bee there
You’d better bee-lieve it
Bee cool
It’s bee-hind you
School buzz
Just bee yourself
You’re pollen my leg
Bee afraid, bee very afraid
Hive never felt this way bee-fore
Let it bee
Bee-lieve in yourself
None of your beeswax
Bee Whizz
Misbeehaving
Bee-hive yourself
A dose of vitamin bee
Bee yourself
I hive a dream
Un-bee-lievable
Truth bee told
Born to bee wild
Sending swarm wishes
And of course… Buzz off!
Honey puns and honey jokes
Why do bees have sticky hair? Because they use honey combs.
What’s a bee’s favourite body part? Their hon-knees.
Where do bees keep their savings? In a honey box.
What do bees say when they get home from work? Hi honey, I’m home!
What do bees do with their honey? They cell it.
Your honey or your life
Honey, you’re so sweet
Get your honey’s worth
You’re so honey
Honey-thing is possible
Honey, I’m home!
You’re sweeter than honey
Honey, I’m stuck on you
I’m having an epip-honey
Honey, comb here
More hilarious bee puns
You’re bee-autiful
Meant to bee
A force to bee reckoned with
Buzz word
Hive mind
A hive of activity
I don’t hive a clue
Hive five
Hive a nice day
The hive’s the limit
Queen bee
Like pollen teeth
Pollen power
Beauty is in the eye of the bee-holder
Bee positive
Bee prepared
Bee my love
Bee-ware
Bee the change
Even more brilliant bee puns
To bee or not to bee
Buzzing with excitement
That’s ap-pollen
I’ve pollen in love
I’m bee-sotted
I promise I don’t sting
Not all it’s cracked up to bee
I want to bee alone
Not too shab-bee
Appearances can bee deceiving
Pollen is nothing to sneeze at
Give me a buzz
Having a buzzy day
Stop droning on
I mean bees-ness
On my best bee-haviour
The bee’s knees
Just winging it
I’d do honey-thing for you
Busybee
Make a bee-line for it
These bee puns really sting!
Ready for more bee jokes?
What do bees call a pretentious wasp? Plain snob-bee.
What do you call a ghost bee? A bee boo.
What’s a happy bumblebee’s blood type? Bee positive.
What do you call a bee that’s always complaining? A grumblebee.
What goes zzub-zubb when it travels? A bee flying backwards.
What did one bee say to the other when they landed on the same flower? “Buzz off.”
What vitamin does a bumble bee take? Vitamin Bee.
How do bees invite their friends to a party? They send out pollen-vitations.
What do you call a bee that’s a bad loser? A cry bay-bee.
Why do bees skydive? Because they like the adrenaline buzz.
What do you call a bee that needs a drink? Bee-hydrated.
How can bees fly in the rain? They wear little yellow jackets.
What’s more dangerous than being with a fool? Fooling with a bee.
What do you call honey on a bee? A sticky situation.
When do bees get married? When they’ve found their honey.
What did the team of bees do after they won the game? They celebrated with hive fives.
Why did the bee visit the dermatologist? It had hives.
What do you call a swarm of really small queen bees? The royal wee.
What do you get if you cross a bee and a dog? A bee-gle.
How do bees communicate with each other? They use bee-mail.
What did the bee bank robber say to the tellers? “Your honey or your life.”
What do you call a bee that can’t stop talking? Blab-bee.
Why did the bee deliver a cold pizza? He didn’t know where to buzz in.
Who looks after baby bees? Ba-bee sitters.
What do bees like with their sushi? Wasa-bee.
What do you get when you cross a bee with a doorbell? A hum-dinger.
What do you call a bee that was born in May? A may-bee.
How do bees get to work? On the buzz.
What do you call bears without ears? Bees.
Why do bees love summer? Because it’s swarm outside.
What did the bee say to his girlfriend? “I’ve pollen in love with you.”
What did the bee say to the flower? “Hi, honey!”
What do you call a bee that doesn’t cost anything? A free-bee.
What do bees ask for at the barber shop? A buzz cut.
What’s a bee’s favourite fast food? Hum-burgers.
What’s a bee’s favorite painter? Pablo bee-casso.
What’s a bee’s favourite flower? A bee-gonia.
What’s a bee’s favorite composer? Bee-thoven.
What’s a bee’s favorite novel? The Great Gats-bee.
I’ve also co-written two books called *‘A Year of Nature Craft and Play’ and *A Year of Nature Walks and Games’ which are all about getting kids engaged with nature. Each one is filled with fun games, walks, crafts, gardening and science activities that inspire kids to get creative with nature and explore the amazing natural world. There are 52 budget-friendly nature play ideas, one for every week of the year, all with easy-to-follow instructions and colourful photos. If you’d like to encourage the kids to get outdoors more they’re well worth a look!
More garden and nature inspiration
For more gardening and nature inspiration you might like to take a look at these posts:
“The priority in gardening is no longer just about mastering an aesthetic,” says Bishop. “There is a shift toward being more mindful and ethical. We need to embrace the natural systems that we’ve just forgotten about.” Here’s what you can do at home.
Above: These tiny masked bees are solitary, nesting in twigs and stems. Since they’re so small, they prefer small flowers, even “ones we might not really notice, like those found in an alternative lawn” says Kornbluth. Because of their size, they can go deep inside flowers to get nectar. Not particularly hairy, they don’t carry pollen on their bodies, like other bees, but carry it in their “’crop,’ the upper part of the digestive tract.” This masked bee was spotted foraging on snakeroot in Bishop’s garden.
Grow native plants in your garden.
Native insects coevolved with native plants. They’re part of an intricate food web system. For most organisms, non-native plants are like “plastic fruit in a fruit bowl,” says Kornbluth. “It may look good, but they won’t be able to eat it.” While nectar-eating insects are able to enjoy the sugary, calorie-rich nectar from a wide range of flowers, “pollen, which bees need to feed their young, is more likely to come from the local native species that they have been coevolving with them for many thousands of years,” says Kornbluth. (At Perfect Earth Project, we advocate for at least two-thirds native plants in your garden.)
Don’t use pesticides.
Even organic ones. Pesticides (and that includes insecticides, herbicides, and fungicides) don’t discriminate and will kill all insects—not just the ones you’re targeting. When selecting plants at the nursery, ask if they’ve been treated with pesticides of any kind, especially neonicotinoids, a systemic insecticide that is absorbed by the entire plant rendering every part poisonous to pollinators.
Above: Male longhorn bees feature very long antennae. These bees are specialists of Asteraceae, and especially love sunflowers. Look for them buzzing about in July and August.
Provide nesting spots.
Native bees nest in the ground and in stems and wood piles. “It’s important to remember that the standing dead vegetation you see is full of bees,” says Kornbluth. Try not to cut back stems when flowers are done blooming, but leave them for the bees. If you’re concerned about how that’s going to look, visit The Battery, says Bishop, and see how pretty it is all winter long. “Embracing a plant’s complete life cycle—from seedlings in spring to seed head or grass mound in winter—is a Piet Oudolf trademark,” says Bishop of the visionary Dutch landscape designer who created the garden’s master plan. “By not deadheading, we allow the life cycle to stay on display and integrate into design year-round. And this decay becomes abundant living matter and nest material for pollinators.” It’s also beautiful. “I love the aesthetic: the decay, structure, and different textures of every plant—they each have their own kind of personality,” says Bishop.
But if you must cut some stems back, Kornbluth advises leaving last year’s stems as high as you can. While you’re at it, leave the leaves. In addition to feeding the soil, fallen leaves provide insulation for ground-nesters, like bumblebees and mining bees, as well as other hibernating organisms. “It prevents the surface of the earth from getting too cold, which impacts their survival over the winter,” says Kornbluth.
Look and learn.
“Do a small insect safari at home,” suggests Kornbluth. Bishop has been doing this in her own backyard in Westchester, New York, and happily admits the glee she feels when finding new species in her garden. “Give yourself the opportunity to be meditative and peaceful,” says Kornbluth. See who’s coming to eat. What do you notice about them? What plants are they visiting? When are they appearing? Share what you find on iNaturalist. “The whole process is very eye-opening, engaging, and connecting.”
Recent research into the potential uses of hemp shows that cannabinoids produced by the plant could one day be the source of new natural pesticides, according to researchers at Cornell University in New York. The study by scientists at the School of Integrative Plant Science at Cornell AgriTech’s College of Agriculture and Life Sciences (CALS) found that a higher concentration of cannabinoids in the leaves of hemp plants showed less damage from chewing insects compared with leaves less rich in cannabinoids.
The researchers hope that further study could build on these findings to eventually produce new natural insecticides, most likely for use on non-edible plants only. The potential for using the new pesticides on food crops seems unlikely at this point because of the pharmacological effects of cannabinoids including CBDA, THCA and GBGA, which can be converted to CBD, THC and CBG, respectively, with the addition of heat in a process known as decarboxylation.
Larry Smart, a plant breeder and professor at CALS, says that researchers have studied the intoxicating and medicinal effects of cannabinoids, which are produced almost exclusively by cannabis plants, since the compounds were first identified decades ago. But little research has been conducted to determine exactly why cannabis plants first developed the more than 100 distinct substances.
“It has been speculated that they are defensive compounds, because they primarily accumulate in female flowers to protect seeds, which is a fairly common concept in plants,” said Smart, the senior author of the study, according to a report from Hemp Today.
“But no one has put together a comprehensive set of experimental results to show a direct relationship between the accumulation of these cannabinoids and their harmful effects on insects,” Smart continued.
Cornell’s Hemp Breeding Program Launched in 2017
The research was conducted as part of Cornell’s hemp breeding program, which was launched by the Ivy League university in upstate New York in 2017. The program began its work by evaluating different commercially available hemp cultivars so recommendations could be made to farmers about which varieties are best suited to the local soil and climate.
The researchers noticed that varieties of hemp sourced from a breeding program in Ukraine that did not produce cannabinoids were all highly susceptible to damage from Japanese beetles. Other hemp varietals that produce cannabinoids were not similarly prone to damage from the insects.
“In the absence of cannabinoids, we saw heavy insect damage, and in the presence of cannabinoids, we saw much less damage,” said Smart.
The researchers then isolated CBDA and CBGA for use in controlled insect feeding studies. THCA was not studied as part of the research because strict federal limits on THC in hemp crops prevent Cornell researchers from working with the compound.
The cannabinoid extracts were added to an artificial insect diet in varying concentrations. The researchers determined that insect larvae grew less and had lower rates of survival as the concentration of cannabinoids was increased.
“The study gives us insight into how cannabinoids function in natural systems, and can help us develop new THC-compliant hemp cultivars that maintain these natural built-in defenses against herbivores,” said George Stack, a postdoctoral researcher in Smart’s lab and one of the authors of the new study.
The researchers plan further investigation to determine if sap-sucking insects such as aphids are also adversely affected by cannabinoids. However, Stack noted that the research is hindered by the continued illegality of marijuana at the federal level.
“The potential use of cannabinoids as a pesticide is an exciting area for future research, but there will certainly be regulatory barriers due to pharmacological activity of the compounds, and more studies are needed to understand what pests cannabinoids will be effective against,” Stack said.
The study, “Cannabinoids Function in Defense Against Chewing Herbivores in Cannabis Sativa L.,” was published in October by the peer-reviewed journal Horticulture Research.
Greece’s health ministry is seeking police help against hoaxers who tried to scare foreign tourists out of several Athens short-term rental flats by inventing a bedbug crisis
ByThe Associated Press
December 5, 2023, 12:00 PM
FILE – A bedbug is displayed at the Smithsonian Museum in Washington, March 30, 2011. Greece’s health ministry is seeking police help against hoaxers who tried to scare foreign tourists out of several Athens short-term rental flats by inventing a bedbug crisis. (AP Photo/Carolyn Kaster, File)
The Associated Press
ATHENS, Greece — Greece’s health ministry is seeking police help against hoaxers who tried to scare foreign tourists out of some Athens short-term rental flats by inventing a bedbug crisis.
A ministry statement Tuesday said the posters stuck up outside apartment blocks in the city center, festooned with fake ministry and Athens municipality logos, were “absolutely false.”
The posters, addressed to “dear visitors” in misspelt English, claimed health authorities had ordered local “private guesthouses” evacuated “to protect the public health of permanent Greek tenants.”
Citing a non-existent bedbug infestation, they threatened visitors with a 500-euro fine ($540) for failure to leave their flats, and politely wished them a pleasant stay in Greece.
In addition to a cost-of-living crisis, Athens and other parts of Greece face housing problems largely caused by the proliferation of short-term rental flats — mainly for foreign visitors.
That has helped fuel a surge in long-term rental costs for Greeks, many of whom are priced out of residential areas in central Athens. Property values are also spiraling, in part due to a “golden visa” program offering residence to foreign property investors.
Tourism is a key driver of Greece’s economy, accounting for a fifth of annual output, and 2023 is expected to be a record year for arrivals.
The health ministry said Tuesday it has informed the police “to do what is necessary” about the hoax. It said that “nobody is allowed to terrorize and misinform the public” on public health issues.
Greece has not recorded any major trouble with the blood-sucking creepy-crawlies that recently caused consternation in France.
The artful log pile has become a frequent feature in designer schemes, from the increasingly wild gardens of the Chelsea Flower Show to heritage gardens and newly created private spaces. A biodiversity-boosting stack will provide food, shelter, and a safe haven for all sorts of bugs—beetles, spiders, ladybugs, overwintering bees, newts, and small mammals including mice and shrews. Build it and they will come.
Log piles can provide stunning sculptural elements, too, rationalizing tricky areas, creating repetition through a space, or dividing an area with an informal boundary. Neatly built and thoughtfully placed, the best of these can be more beautiful than a hedge and, not to mention, require less maintenance. Any type of wood will do—simply source logs from your own garden maintenance or tree pruning, or use a neighbor’s prunings. Just remember to avoid removing existing fallen deadwood that is already providing useful habitats.
Placed in a cool, slightly shady spot, the pile will stay moist and provide a base for moss, ferns, and woodland plants which can be added directly into nooks and crannies. A log pile that is positioned across a shady area and a sunnier spot can provide different types of habitat at once.
Above: Nigel Dunnett’s log piles in autumn with a haze of Deschampsia, as well as Euphorbia characias ‘Wulfenii’, and rudbeckias. Photograph by Nigel Dunnett.
Arguably the master of the sculptural wood pile is Professor Nigel Dunnett, whose repeated stacks often feature on his Instagram account. The hugely influential British planting designer’s one acre garden has stunning views of the surrounding Peak District and takes inspiration from the dry stone walls dotted across that landscape, as well as the wavy hedges at Piet Oudolf’s garden at Hummelo in the Netherlands. But for Dunnett, the stacks also help define and rationalize his sloping site and connect it with the hilly landscape beyond. Over the growing season, the logs become immersed in naturalistic planting, where they play a supporting role. But in winter when the herbaceous plants die back the log stacks are revealed and become a valuable sculptural feature—and a winter home to myriad species.
Above: In deep winter, the forms are revealed. Photograph by Nigel Dunnett.
Dunnett isn’t the only designer harnessing the biodiversity-boosting power of logs. They feature frequently in the designs of Tom Massey too. He created an entire boundary using lengths of logs interspersed with panels of cross-sections at this year’s RHS Chelsea Flower Show in his Royal Entomological Society garden, a space squarely aimed at the study of insects and ways we can support them in the garden. In 2021, the designer created sculptural log walls from biochar ash logs in his Yeo Valley Organic Garden.
Above: The wildlife-friendly log pile can become a platform for planting. At Tattenhall Hall in Cheshire, England, all the garden’s prunings are used in dead hedges or log walls. Here, a fallen tree in a woodland area becomes the support for a vigorous ‘Rambling Rector’ rose. Photograph by Clare Coulson.
Above: Landscape designer Edwina von Gal incorporates similar habitat piles into her designs. Taking planting right up to the piles creates more shelter and food for visiting wildlife. Photograph by Melissa Ozawa, from Habitat Piles: Turning Garden Debris Into Shelter and Sculpture.
Above: Neatly stacked woodpile create a sculptural feature. Photograph by Britt Willoughby Dyer.
NEW YORK — Birdwing butterflies are among the rarest and largest to grace the planet, their 10-inch (25.4-centimeter) wingspans flapping through the rainforests of Southeast Asia and Australia. Their sheer size can make them hard to miss.
But the U.S. attorney’s office in Brooklyn says Charles Limmer made tens of thousands of dollars over the past year by illegally trafficking flying insects, including endangered birdwings — whose numbers have fallen because of diminishing habitat and illegal poaching.
Trafficking of wildlife collectibles has become a serious and lucrative enterprise, despite a worldwide crackdown.
On Wednesday, the same federal authorities in Brooklyn announced six-count indictments against two people, one from Alabama and the other from Georgia, for importing, transporting and possessing $1.2 million in taxidermized birds and eggs. Federal prosecutors say the collection includes nearly 800 birds and about 2,600 eggs.
The two are accused of using sites such as eBay and Etsy to buy the mounted birds from around the world, including from Germany to South Africa and Uruguay. The collection of birds included protected species of canaries, falcons and woodpeckers.
U.S. Attorney Breon Peace said in a statement that it was “in our national and global interest to enforce federal laws and treaties” to protect endangered wildlife “from the harm of alleged profiteers.”
The six-count indictment against Limmer, a 75-year-old butterfly aficionado from Commack, New York, accuses him of working with overseas collaborators to smuggle some 1,000 lepidoptera, including some of the rarest and most endangered moths and butterflies in the world.
Federal authorities in New York say the Long Island man smuggled dried specimens of the species, circumventing U.S. laws by labeling shipments as “decorative wall coverings,” “origami paper craft” and “wall decorations.”
Attempts to reach Limmer by phone and email were unsuccessful.
Federal law prohibits the commercial export or import of wildlife without permission from the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service. Additional authorization would need to be secured for endangered species, as part of an international partnership to protect wildlife from trafficking.
Limmer previously had a federal license to import and export wildlife, but it was suspended in October 2022.
Since then, the indictment alleges, Limmer illegally imported and exported more than $200,000 worth of shipments.
An eBay page of a seller going by “limmerleps” shows the account had made more than 4,600 sales on the shopping platform, many of the most recent sales were moths and butterflies. There were two birdwing specimens currently on sale and two were sold over the past year, according to the website.
An Etsy page connected to a seller going by the name “Limmer” had four ads for birdwings still advertised on Wednesday, including featuring a collection of five specimens with an asking price of $133. The seller’s listed address coincides with Limmer’s.
The indictment also seeks to force Limmer to give up his collection of some 1,000 butterflies, moths and other insects prosecutors say he illegally procured from overseas.
If convicted, the three men face up to 20 years in prison.
