Bug Squad

Three little words can help us determine what to plant in a bee friendly garden: "attractive to bees." Escallonia, a fast-growing evergreen shrub often planted as a hedge or screen, is indeed attractive to bees. Bees work the blossoms like there's no tomorrow--and no colony collapse disorder.

Our Artemisia, a silvery-leafed shrub bordering our bee friendly garden, looks quite orange and black these days. It's not for lack of water or some exotic disease. It's the ladybug (aka lady beetle) population. If you look closely, you'll see eggs, larvae and pupae and the adults.

Talk about agility. When you watch a honey bee foraging, it's a lesson in aerial acrobatics. She glides to her target flower, touching down gracefully and accurately. As she gathers nectar, she's vertical, horizontal, upside down and right side up again.

It's raining bumble bees in our pool. Yellow-faced bumble bees (Bombus vosnesenskii). And honey bees (Apis mellifera), too. While nectaring lavender, catmint, tower of jewels, sedum and other plants, some of the foragers land in our pool. Talk about no depth perception.

It's not often you see a ladybug and a honey bee sharing the same plant. The ladybug, a predator in disguise, devours aphids like a kid does M&Ms. The honey bee, all buzziness, works furiously to collect nectar or pollen for her hive. Sometimes a lavender patch can bring them together.