NEWSLETTER

Dr. Tom Sanford was awarded the American Association of Professional Apiculturist's award for excellence in apicultural extension at the American Beekeeping Federation convention in Colorado Springs, Colorado.

During the 1997 Annual meeting of the Entomological Society of America, December 14-18, in Nashville, TN, Pauline Lawrence was elected to the International Affairs Committee for a three-year term.

While in Nashville Dr. Lawrence and coauthors presented a paper entitled: Ovarian proteins of insect parasites of tephritid fruit flies as part of the symposium: "Insect Parasitoids-Their Physiology and Biochemistry". The paper was co-authored by Stephen Irwin, Ernest Harris and Rene Bautista.

Marjorie A. Hoy attended a Keystone Symposium on "Toward the Genetic Manipulation of Insects" in Taos, New Mexico January 9-15, 1998 where she presented an invited talk. Again out west, Dr. Hoy presented an invited seminar at the Department of Entomology, University of Nebraska-Lincoln on January 21 and lectured to the Insect Genetics class on January 22, where she also signed her book, Insect Molecular Genetics. More recently, Dr. Hoy presented an invited seminar in the Department of Biology, University of Central Florida, Orlando on February 10.

Jon Allen and Jason Byrd attended the National Institute of Justice Grant Reporting Meeting (US Department of Justice) in San Francisco February 7-13. They presented a summary of ‘The Maggot Model' for Post Mortem Interval estimation for use in crime scene investigation. This was a very different sort of research meeting involving everything from DNA fingerprinting to explosives residue analysis.

Dini Miller has successfully (more or less) completed her first multi-media presentation for Dr. Don Hall's 300+ student class, The Insects. Dini presented her usual "Cockroach Appreciation" lecture but after careful instruction from Dr. Hall was able to bring it into the new millennium with a combination of slides, PowerPoint and ELMO (a type of overhead projector). Dini would like to thank Dr. Hall for upgrading her.

Hugh Smith will be leaving this week to go to San Geronimo, Guatemala for 5-6 months of field research working on intercropping for whitefly management. This portion of his research has been funded through a grant he received in May for $13,325 from the National Security Education Program. Hugh is a modest man and this information had to be dragged out of him; if you see him in the halls be sure to give him a big hug and wish him safe passage on his long drive (that is right DRIVE) to Guatemala.

A partial eclipse of the sun on February 26th will begin approximately at noon and end two hours later. This is the last eclipse of this century; you won't see another solar eclipse until 2016. Dr. Tarjan will have a telescope equipped with a sun filter mounted in the department's atrium-courtyard. For those of you amateur astronomers that wish to observe this phenomenon, keep in mind that the maximum eclipse will be at 12:59pm. A 10 minute window before and after the maximum will offer the best viewing. Although from our vantage point in Gainesville it will not be a complete eclipse (there will be 37% of the sun's diameter hidden but only 26% of the sun's area) we may be able to see sunspots in the photosphere. A WORD OF CAUTION: Do not attempt to look directly at the sun through a pinhole pierced through cardboard, or through smoked glasses. Neither of these is safe. The solar filter which will be mounted on Dr. Tarjan's telescope is safe.

There's a job opening in our department for an Assistant Professor, specializing in biological control of weeds. This is a full-time (12 month), tenure track position with an appointment of research (70% Florida Agricultural Experiment Station) and extension (30% Florida Cooperative Extension Service). The appointee will develop and conduct a competitive research program on the biological control of weeds in Florida, using imported phytophagous arthropods as biological control agents.

Weissling, T.J., J. E. Pena, R. M. Giblin-Davis and J. L. Knapp, Jr. (February, 1998). Sugarcane rootstock borer weevil, Diaprepes abbreviatus (L.). UF/IFAS Featured Creatures. EENY-24. http://entomology.ifas.ufl.edu/creatures/citrus/sugarcane_rootstock_borer_weevil.htm

Nguyen, K.B. and G.C. Smart, Jr. (December, 1997) Scanning electron microscope studies of spicules and gubernacula of Steinernema spp. (Nemata:Steinernematidae). Nematologica 43:465-480.

The Outreach program is off to a good start in 1998. Claudia Riegel spoke to Girl Scout Troop 808 about nematology. They spent about 1 hour in her lab extracting nematodes from soil and looking at them through a microscope. Janete Brito brought in some root-knot females and explained the importance of studying nematology.

Jason Squitter, Tim McCoy, Janete Brito, and Claudia spoke to a kindergarten class from the Community Christian School of Keystone Heights. Jason added excitement to the tour by leaving loose grasshopper in his laboratory to jump about during his talk. The kids thought it was excellent! If you don't think this kind of Outreach is important or rewarding just take a look at the bulletin board outside of room 2216 to see the thank you letters from some of the groups that have toured our department. SO HERE IS YOUR CHANCE! Claudia needs 4 volunteers that can speak with 100 6th graders from Fort Clarke Middle school that will visit our department March 22 at 10 am. This is a great opportunity to hone your communication skills and interact with young people who are truly excited to learn about entomology and nematology.

Departmental Spring Picnic

Miriam Hay-Roe will be organizing the spring picnic. If you are interested in helping please contact her at 392-5894.

Kanapaha Spring Festival

The sign up sheet for Kanapaha is in the graduate room. The department has a new tent and we need volunteers to set up (March 28th at 3:00 pm) and to take down (March 29th at 5:00 pm) the tent. Volunteers are also needed to work at the fair March 28th and March 29th.

Butterfly Garden

Akers Pence has scheduled an organizational meeting for Friday February 20 at 4:00 pm in the conference room to discuss the type of plants and equipment are needed to prepare the garden. Please contact him at 392-5894 for more information.

Urban Pest Collections

ENSO currently has orders for five cockroach collections. Thanks to Dini Miller and Jeryl Gahlhoff one collection is finished. Everyone is invited to drop by room 2216 every Wednesday night from 6:00 to 8:00pm to pin some of these beautiful and apparently profitable insects. Each collection raises $500 dollars for ENSO, so please make time to help out.

School IPM The Department has a grant from the EPA, Region 4, to develop a WWW site on Integrated Pest Management in Schools. The cooperators on the grant are Philip Koehler, Tom Fasulo, and Clay Scherer (Ph.D. student under Koehler). Matt Downey, one of Tom's OPS employees is also a key figure in the site's development. Although the site is under development there is some information now available and the site is open for use.

Point your WWW browsers to: http://schoolipm.ifas.ufl.edu/

Pass the address on to anyone you know who is interested in school IPM.

WHITEFLY Knowledgebase

The USDA WHITEFLY Knowledgebase has been upgraded to Windows format, including full-color, high-resolution photographs. Additional photographs on predators and parasites have been added. WHITEFLY is a computerized, hypertext knowledgebase on four species of whiteflies: the silverleaf whitefly, the sweetpotato whitefly, the banded winged whitefly and the greenhouse whitefly. It contains information on whitefly identification, biology, life cycle, damage, management, and control. A graphical key helps users identify which of the four species is causing them problems. Whitefly experts in California, Florida, Georgia, North Carolina, and Texas provided the information, graphics and photographs contained in the knowledgebase. See http://entomology.ifas.ufl.edu/fasulo/whiteflies/

Southeast Pest Conference

The announcement for the 1998 Southeast Pest Control Conference on the Pest Alert WWW site now includes a downloadable registration form in PDF format. For those who don't have the free Adobe Acrobat Reader on their systems, a link to the Adobe site is provided. Pest Alert is available on the WWW at: http://entomology.ifas.ufl.edu/pestalert/

Intellectual Property Do you have questions about your intellectual property rights on the Internet? Many people do not know if it is even possible to copyright Web information. Actually, it is federal law that anything you create is automatically copyrighted. You don't even have to use the word "Copyright." However, since many people think that material from UF is considered public domain, it is a good idea to place the words "Copyright University of Florida 'year created'" on your WWW pages. It is also suggested that you write out the word "Copyright" and not use the copyright symbol (a "c" surrounded by a circle) as different browsers might not display that symbol property. For more information contact Tom Fasulo at 392-1901 ext. 136 or fasulo@ufl.edu

Dr. Hans Herren was named the University of Florida's York Distinguished Lecturer for 1998. Dr. Herren received the 1995 World Food Prize for his work in Africa on biological control of the cassava mealybug. This project is one of the largest, most successful, and best-documented biological control projects in the world. This dynamic and exciting speaker will be visiting the Department of Entomology and Nematology on Tuesday, February 24, and Wednesday, February 25. He will present a talk for the general public on Tuesday evening (7:30 PM, 235, 245, 246 Reitz Union), "Insect Science for Sustainable Development: A Revisited Agenda", with a reception to follow. On Wednesday he will present a special seminar in the department (1031 ENY, 3:30 PM) entitled "ICIPE, a Focal Point for Insect Science in Africa and the Tropics".

Dr. Herren will meet with graduate students on Tuesday morning beginning at 11 AM and will have a pizza lunch with them in Room 1014.

Dini Miller will be attending the ESA Southeastern Branch meeting in Chattanooga, Tenn. March 1-4, where she will present "Enhancement of spray formulation insecticides with an aqueous extract of German cockroach fecal pellets" in the student competition. Dini is also coordinating the Student Symposium at the SEB meetings and will have the opportunity to live out one of her life's dream of presenting a dung beetle talk at a scientific meeting. She will be presenting Kevina Vulinec's work "Dung beetles, monkeys and seed survival in Amazonian rain forests" (Kevina is currently in Brazil). Dini will then move on to Kansas City where she has been invited to give a seminar on cockroach biology and behavior at the Kansas Pest Control Association's annual meeting. The following is a list of upcoming departmental seminars: Thursday February 19 Dr. Robert Maegher will present "Monitoring Fall Armyworm Populations Using Pheromones and Attractants" Thursday February 26 Jim Wameke will present "Pest Management at Disney" Thursday March 5 Dr. Dawn Gouge will present "Natural Born Killers: Control of Pink Bollworm Using Entomopathogenic Nematodes" All Seminars begin at 3:30 and are held in the Dept. of Entomology and Nematology, room 1031.

Next week two seminars worth noting will take place at the Florida Museum of Natural History (Museum classroom @ street level, Dickinson Hall): Monday February 23 @ 1:00 pm Dr. Mark Chase of the Molecular Systematics Section, Jodrell Laboratory, Royal Botanic Gardens, Kew, England will present "Congruent Analysis of Nuclear and Plastid Gene Sequences: Prospects for Angiosperm Phylogeny.

Tuesday 24 Feb., 1998 @ 12:00 noon Dr Michael Fay also of the Jodrell Laboratory will present "Molecular tools in Conservation Genetics".

Conference Room Policy

Just a note to remind faculty, staff, and students that they are welcome to use the conference rooms for meetings and study sessions, but remember to leave the room in the same (or better) condition in which it was found. This means replacing chairs that were borrowed, erasing the whiteboards, and emptying trash containers. Your cooperation is appreciated.

Newsletter Listserv

In an attempt to make the newsletter more accessible it is now available on a listserv. This allows people to sign up to receive the electronic version easily and automatically. Simply send e-mail to listserv@lists.ufl.edu and in the text of the message type

Turn off any signature file, if you have one. You will receive instructions for confirming your subscription, how to unsubscribe, and further information on the rules for this listserv.

The next newsletter will be published Thursday, March 26. Deadline for contributions is Monday, March 23.

This version of the newsletter is edited and published for the Web by Tim McCoy.

Hardcopy Editor: Tim McCoy

February 1998. Updated March 2003.