Category Archives: People
H.S. Stevens longtime Dallas garden writer
My first year in Extension someone told me about this H.S. Stevens fellow, a super-savvy gardener who used a hypodermic syringe to treat his squash vines with Bt (a natural control agent that controls squash vine borer and other caterpillars), and knew everything there was to know about gardening in the Dallas area. When I finally met H.S., he was pretty much everything I expected. Gravelly voiced, opinionated and sincerely enthusiastic about his job bringing gardening to kids through his Texas Agricultural Extension Service job. H.S. left Extension… Read More →
Car Talk adds wildlife (including insects) section
Any of you who find yourself out driving around on a Saturday morning, and have happened to tune into an NPR station, have probably heard the radio show Car Talk. Who would have guessed that two goofy brothers answering car maintenance questions on the radio would have been successful? I wouldn’t. Yet they’ve become an enormous hit, at least among NPR listeners with cars over a certain age. The Car Talk brothers usually make me laugh. So I was pleasantly surprised a few months ago when I got… Read More →
Bugguide.net innovator profiled
One of the links we include in the Insect Identification Help page is BugGuide.net. This is a great site for insect identification and networking with knowledgeable entomologists willing to help anyone get an insect identified. I use it a lot and direct insect enthusiasts there frequently. Until now, however, I didn’t know a lot about how the site came to be. A recent story from Iowa State University profiles one of the developers of the site, ISU systems analyst John VanDyk. Turns out that not only is John… Read More →
Aggie beetle freak
Trying to think of a catchy, but apt, headline that would describe Ed Riley is a little difficult. But “beetle freak” comes close… in the best sense of the word “freak” of course. Ed is the associate curator of the Department of Entomology’s insect museum, and if anyone truly loves beetles, it’s Ed. Texas Parks and Wildlife magazine just did a very nice article about Ed in the June edition. To see an online version, click here. I understand from Mike Quinn, who took pictures for the story,… Read More →
