December 2010
Faculty News
Ever wonder why Dr. Howard Frank travels so often to Central America? Well, when you get to spend time at exotic resorts like the Hamanasi Adventure and Dive Resort, recently named the Belize hotel of the year, field research can be fun!. Actually, Dr. Frank led several University of Florida scientists to Belize in search of parasites of the Mexican bromeliad weevil, which is responsible for devastating losses to Florida's bromeliad biota. The hotel they stayed at posted information about their search on the its web site.
Student News
Dr. Carl Barfield, Undergraduate Coordinator, reports that it has been quite a while since we have graduated as many undergraduate students as will finish up at the end of this term.
Each year the International Center at the University of Florida recognizes six international students from the College of Agriculture and Life Sciences by presenting an Outstanding Academic Achievement Award. This year, two of our graduate students, Vivek Kumar and Garima Kakkar were among those six students receiving the award which was presented on 17 November at the award function in the Reitz Union on the UF campus in Gainesville.
The Entomological Society of America's (ESA) annual meeting begins this weekend in San Diego. On 8 December, several ESA-bound students participated in our department's ESA Student Presentation Practice/Competition Session. This allowed them to practice their talks and obtain constructive feedback from faculty and fellow students. Congratulations to our first place winner Teresia Nyoike who won a $100 travel grant provided by our department's Entomology and Nematology Student Organization, and to our second place winner Ameya Gondhalekar, winner of a $10 Pizza Hut Gift Card. Good luck to all presenters as you represent the UF/IFAS Entomology and Nematology Department at ESA!
Publications
Medal J, Cuda J. 2010. Establishment and initial impact of the leaf-beetle Gratiana boliviana (Chrysomelidae), first biocontrol agent released against tropical soda apple in Florida. Florida Entomologist 93: 493-500.
Fishel FM, Langeland KA, Cuda JP. 2010. Reaching the masses: using Polycom for a one-day recertification event for pesticide applicators, pp. 54-55. In Jordi R, Hazell J, Diller A (eds.). Proceedings of the 24th Annual Meeting of the Extension Professional Associations of Florida.
Meetings and Presentations
Dr. Julio Medal co-organized the Water Hyacinth Management Workshop, held 8-12 November 2010 at the Ecuador Agriculture University of Manabi in Calceta, Ecuador. The workshop was attended by 89 technicians and professionals. Dr. Medal presented six talks: 1) "Biology of water hyacinth," 2) "Biocontrol of water hyacinth in Mexico and Central America," 3) "Biocontrol of water hyacinth," 4) "Potential uses," 5) "Negative effects of water hyacinth on aquatic systems," and 6) "Mechanical control of water hyacinth." The next workshop is scheduled for August 2011 in Ecuador. The workshop was sponsored by the United Nation's Food and Agriculture Organization (FAO).
Dr. James P. Cuda was an invited speaker for the 15th Annual Southwest Florida Invasive Species Workshop held at Florida Gulf Coast University, 1 December. Cuda gave the presentation "Update on the stem boring weevil Apocnemidophorus pipitzi, a promising biological control agent for Brazilian peppertree."
During the Florida AgEXpo 2010, held at the GCREC, Ph.D. student Vivek Kumar presented a poster on "Standardizing cultural practices for enhanced activity of three entomopathogens in regulating chilli thrips, Scirtothrips dorsalis Hood, on pepper"; while Garima Kakkar presented a poster on "Within plant and spatial distribution of Frankliniella schultzei (Trybom) infesting field cucumbers in South Florida."
Outreach
Thank you to those members and friends of the department who participated in our November outreach activities. Ocali Country Days was a big success: total attendance for that event was 4,239 elementary school students and 3,275 of the general public!
Ocali Country Days: Crystal Atkinson shows the kids where
to look for bed bugs with our newest interactive display.
Thomas Fasulo is the newsletter editor. Departmental faculty, staff, students and alumni can submit news anytime to fasulo@ufl.edu. Issues usually are published by early mid-month. Submit items for an issue by the 7th of that month.
UF-Bugnews-L listserv subscribers receive notices when issues 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. Thomas Fasulo does the HTML coding.
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December 2010.