June 2006

Faculty News

The May 2006 issue of Pest Control magazine (http://www.pestcontrolmag.com/pestcontrol/) has a cover article about Insect Control Research, a Maryland-based company. While the article covers the company's current projects, there are two multi-page sidebars about the company's founder Dr. Eugene Gerberg, an adjunct professor in our department, who sold his company in 1990. The sidebars cover his work on mosquitoes in the 1960s and his work as a U.S. Army Lieutenant in the medical corps during World War II. The army sidebar shows Lt. Gerberg treating for bed bugs at an army barracks at Camp Lee, Virginia. Dr. Gerberg served in other areas of the world, stayed active in the Reserves after the war, and retired as a Colonel.

Dr. Jaret Daniels announces a new Web site for his Florida Butterfly Monitoring Network (FBMN) program at http://www.flbutterflies.net/. The FBMN is a statewide citizen scientist program that trains public volunteers and directly engages university scientists, zoological institution staff members, and DEP land managers in field-based conservation by surveying the health of butterfly populations throughout Florida. The data collected on the distribution and population trends of both common and imperiled species will be used to facilitate the development of appropriate conservation and management strategies.

Dr. Oscar Liburd traveled to Guyana, South America, as a member of a USAID team to assess pest management practices employed by farmers in the Essequibo region. While in Guyana, Dr. Liburd met with several Agricultural Extension Agents and gave a presentation to 18 agricultural personnel on "IPM tactics for management of key vegetable and fruit pests."

Dr. James P. Cuda is participating in the UF's Research Experience for Undergraduate Students that is affiliated with the SEAGEP Program during the Summer C Semester. Cuda serves as a mentor for Mona St. Val, an undergraduate student majoring in nursing.

Staff News

Pat Hope, graphic artist, retired 1 June after nearly 12 years of service to our department. She produced hundreds, if not thousands, of drawings, maps, posters, displays and more for faculty and students, and her services and friendly disposition will be greatly missed. Colleagues honored her with a reception and gifts on 31 May. Pat's retirement plans include world travel, golf, and spending quality time with her family and friends. - Jane Medley

Student News

The Fall 2006 departmental seminar coordinators are graduate students Amit Sethi, Seth Bybee, Emily Saarinen, Murugesan Rangasamy and Craig Roubos. Please contact them if you have suggestions for speakers.

Jennifer M. Zaspel, a graduate student in Dr. Marc Branham's laboratory, recently passed her Ph.D. qualifying exams.

Ph.D. student Barry Alto was awarded a two-year Gaylord Donnelley Postdoctoral Fellowship at Yale University, Ecology and Evolutionary Biology Department. He starts September 2006.

Ph.D. student Amit Sethi is being sponsored by the Rocky Mountain Conference of Entomologists to attend and present a talk at its upcoming 77th annual meeting in Woodland Park, Colorado, during 30 July-3 August.

Dr. Akers Pence spoke on "Simple steps you can take to protect a locally uncommon butterfly, the Sweadner's Juniper Hairstreak," at a meeting of the North Central FL Chapter, North American Butterfly Association, 11 May, in Gainesville, Florida.

Dr. Yasmin Cardoza (M.S. ‘98, Ph.D. ‘02) has returned to Gainesville, from Madison, WI, where she was a Research Associate for 2 1/2 years working on microbial symbioses of bark beetles, particularly spruce beetles (see http://entomology.wisc.edu/~cardoza/). Previously, after receiving her Ph.D., Dr. Cardoza worked for CSIRO in Perth, Australia. On 5 June, she started a two-year appointment as Research Entomologist with Dr. Robert Vander Meer in the Imported Fire Ant and Household Pest Unit at USDA/CMAVE Laboratory, Gainesville.

Dixon WN. (May 2006). Gall wasps, Callirhytis quercusclaviger (Ashmead) and Callirhytis cornigera (Osten Sacken). Featured Creatures. EENY-368. http://entomology.ifas.ufl.edu/creatures/trees/Callirhytis_gall_wasps.htm

Woodruff RF, Fasulo TR. (May 2006). Mango seed weevil, Sternochetus mangiferae (Fabricius). Featured Creatures. EENY-371. http://entomology.ifas.ufl.edu/creatures/fruit/beetles/mango_seed_weevil.htm

Harris DL. (May 2006). Khapra beetle, Trogoderma granarium Everts. Featured Creatures. EENY-372. http://entomology.ifas.ufl.edu/creatures/urban/beetles/khapra_beetle.htm

Fasulo TR. 2006. Yanks, Rebs & Bees: How to be Safe in the Field. The Civil War News 31:5. 3 pp. [This was one of three cover articles for this newspaper.]

Gyeltshen J, Hodges AC. (May 2006). Dogwood borer, Synanthedon scitula (Harris). Featured Creatures. EENY-374. http://entomology.ifas.ufl.edu/creatures/trees/moths/dogwood_borer.htm

Costa C, Vanin S, Lawrence J, Ide S, Branham M. 2006. Review of the Family Brachypsectridae (Coleoptera: Elateroidea). Annals of the Entomological Society of America. 99: 409-432. [This issue of the Annals also carried an SEM of a brachypsectrid larva, discussed in the article, on its cover.]

Branham M. 2006. The fireflies of the Fernando de Zayas Collection, Havana, Cuba with Notes on Their Taxonomic Status (Coleoptera: Lampyridae). Coleopterists Bulletin 60: 49-52.

Gyeltshen J, Hodges AC. (May 2006). Azalea lace bug, Stephanitis pyrioides (Scott). Featured Creatures. EENY-373. http://entomology.ifas.ufl.edu/creatures/orn/shrubs/azalea_lace_bug.htm

Lauzon HAM, Garcia-Maruniak A, Zanotto PM de A, Clemente JC, Herniou EA, Lucarotti C J, Arif BM, Maruniak JE. 2006. Genomic comparison of Neodiprion sertifer and Neodiprion lecontei nucleopolyhedroviruses and identification of potential hymenopteran baculovirus specific ORFs. Journal of General Virology 87: 1477-1489.

Time Is Running Out

Dr. Rudi Scheffrahn reminds everyone they have until 16 June to submit papers and posters for the 23-26 July 2006 Florida Entomological Society (FES) meeting in Jupiter, FL. See the "Call for Papers" form in the latest FES newsletter at http://www.flaentsoc.org/fes06v2.pdf.

Meetings and Presentations

Moeri OE, Cuda JP, Overholt WA, Bloem S, Carpenter JE. 2006. F1 Sterile Insect Technique (F1SIT): A Novel Approach to Host Range Testing for Weed Biological Control? FAO/IAEA Interregional Training Course on "The Use of the Sterile Insect and Related Techniques for the Integrated Area-wide Management of Insect Pests." University of Florida, Gainesville, FL; May 10-June 7.

Dr. Jaret Daniels was an invited speaker at the 2006 Epcot International Flower& Garden Festival in Kissimmee. He presented six talks on "Landscaping for Butterflies" during 18-21 May.

Dr. Marc Branham, Jennifer Zaspel, Seth Bybee and Anchana Thancharoen, of the Branham Lab, attended the first annual "UF/FSU Systematics Symposium" held at Cedar Key on 12 May. Dr. Branham and Seth Bybee each presented oral papers on their research.

Dr. James P. Cuda gave an invited presentation, "Brazilian Peppertree Defoliating Sawfly Heteroperreyia hubrichi: Proposed Field Risk Assessment Study," at the USFWS South Florida Ecological Services Office, Vero Beach, FL, 9 May.

Dr. James Cuda and Judy Gillmore attended the Noxious Weed and Invasive Plant Review Committee Meeting held in Gainesville, 10 May. The purpose of the meeting was to discuss applications for noxious weed designations and review the current Florida Department of Agriculture and Consumer Services Noxious Weed & Invasive Plant List.

Dr. James Cuda participated in the 2006 UF/IFAS Extension Symposium held in Gainesville, 15-18 May. Cuda spoke in two of the concurrent sessions on "Weeds Growing Everywhere, Affecting Everyone," and "Dealing with Issues Surrounding Aquatic, Marine and Natural Resource Invasive Species." His presentations focused on biological weed control and Invasive Plant Management- the Other IPM.

Dr. James Cuda gave an invited presentation, "Biological Control of Weeds: Basic Principles and Prospects for North Florida," at the Apalachicola Watershed Invasives Working Group Meeting held at the St. Joseph Bay State Buffer Preserve in the Panhandle, 23 May.

Grants

Ph.D. student Seth Bybee, of Dr. Marc Branham's lab, was awarded a $1,400 Graduate Research Award from the Society of Systematic Biologists. This is an international society and competition for this award is intensely competitive. Bybee will use the award to travel to the Institute of Paleontology in Moscow, the largest collection of fossil odonates in the world, to study fossil odonates for his Ph.D. dissertation research on "The Evolution of Flight in Holodonata."

Dr. Jaret Daniels received a $15,687 contract from the Florida Fish and Wildlife Conservation Commission's Office of Recreational Services to produce a series of four Florida butterfly-related publications: A Checklist of Florida Butterflies, Butterfly Watching Basics, Florida Butterfly Gardening, and 50 Common Butterflies of Florida.

Drs. James P. Cuda and William A. Overholt received two grants totaling $54,662 from the Florida Department of Environmental Protection. The first is a renewal of the grant proposal "Classical Biological Control of Brazilian Peppertree (Schinus terebinthifolius) in Florida" and the other was a new proposal entitled, "Screening of a New Candidate Biological Control Agent of Brazilian Peppertree (Schinus terebinthifolius) in Florida."

Mole Crickets and IPM

Dr. Howard Frank wishes to point you to an excellent article "Long-lasting Control of Mole Crickets in Pastures Using Integrated Pest Management," that Dr. Robert Kluson of Sarasota County Extension did for that county's April newsletter. See http://sarasota.extension.ufl.edu/Ag/April%202006%20SC%20Ext%20Newsletter.html.

Seminar Invitation

Drs. Ale and Jim Maruniak invite you to attend the student presentations from ENY 6822C "Molecular Biology Techniques of Invertebrates and their Pathogens," at 9 am on 22 June in room 1031. The presentations cover the molecular applications of each student's thesis or dissertation project. Each presentation will last 12 minutes, followed by 3 minutes for questions and answers. The students and their organisms of interest are:

Amit Sethi- Diabrotica beetle; Ramandeep Kaur- root knot nematode; Matt Lehnert - swallowtail butterfly; Dulce Bustamante - mosquito; Marsha Wheeler- termite; Dr. KoonHui Wang - sting nematode; and Stacey Watts - flaviviruses.

Butterflies in Your Stomach?

The UF/IFASpeakers Toastmaster Club held elections for the 2006-2007 year. Several members from our department were elected to positions. Ph.D. student Matt Tarver is President; Elena Rhodes, (M.S., ‘05, ) who will begin work on a Ph.D. this Fall, is VP of Education; Ph.D. student John Herbert is VP of Membership; and James Kocher is Treasurer. In addition, James serves as Area 42 Governor, overseeing 6 clubs in the Gainesville area.

James Kocher and Elena Rhodes both completed the 10 projects of the Basic Communication Manual and have earned the title of Competent Toastmaster (CTM). James also qualified for the Competent Leader (CL) award.

Membership is open to anyone wishing to improve her or his speaking and leadership skills, and is free for current ENSO members. See http://toastmasters.ifas.ufl.edu for more information.

LIFE in the Department

The May 26th issue covers the Natural Area Teaching Lab, a Principles of Entomology field trip, the Brain Bowl and the little island that has its own termite species.

The May 12th issue covers selecting your mate, lovebugs, the Southeast Pest Conference, the Central Florida Fair, students rating their professor, entomology workshops and distance education.

Mike Sanford edits this photographic journal of our department, located at http://life.ifas.ufl.edu/Index.html.

Best of the Bugs

Our Best of the Bugs committee gave this departmental award to the Beetles and Rock Art in Libya Web site. This award is seldom given, as only 15 sites have received this designation since January 2002. The Best of the Bugs site is available at http://entomology.ifas.ufl.edu/fasulo/pests/bestbugs/ .

Newsletter Minutia

Thomas Fasulo is the newsletter editor. You can send news to him at fasulo@ufl.edu. Issues are published the middle of each month. Submit items for an issue by the 7th of that month.

Printed copies are distributed only within Building 970. UF-Bugnews-L listserv subscribers receive notices when HTML and PDF copies are posted on the newsletter Web site at http://entomology.ifas.ufl.edu/news/ , which has instructions for subscribing and unsubscribing. Pam Howell and Nancy Sanders review the newsletter for errors and prepare the print version for distribution. Andrew Puckett and Thomas Fasulo code the HTML version.

During the last 12 months, the newsletter Web site recorded 47,137 distinct visitors and 84,732 page views. In addition, visitors downloaded 2,849 PDF files during January-May 2006.

June 2006.