Cornell Department of Entomology

09/02/2026

08/27/2026

Protecting crops and pollinators takes teamwork. 🌻🐝 Cornell Department of Entomology researchers and Cornell Integrated Pest Management are working with New York growers to address the challenges and opportunities created by the state's new pesticide ban. Read more:

Preliminary Cornell research on managing the dreaded seedcorn maggot is giving hope to growers across the state ahead of New York’s 2029 ban on neonicotinoid pesticides in field crops: Side-by-side farm trials of neonic-treated vs. untreated corn showed no difference in yield.

08/26/2026

Thank you to everyone who stopped by the Dyce Lab for our 2026 honey extraction! 🍯🐝 It was great to connect, share our excitement for bees (and birds!), and send everyone home with a sweet treat to welcome the fall semester. We look forward to seeing you again soon!
Below are the numbers for this year:

Number of participants: ~550
Youngest participant: 8 weeks old (unless I missed someone younger!)
Furthest travelled to get to Dyce: Busan, South Korea
Most enthusiastic participant: James the dog (as usual)
Total honey extracted: ~156 gallons (1872 lbs)
Taken home by wonderfully helpful participants (thank you!): ~130 gallons (1560 lbs)
Consumed by the most enthusiastic participant: Not too much this year! But there’s still some cleaning to do...🐝

08/26/2026

Preliminary Cornell research on managing the dreaded seedcorn maggot is giving hope to growers across the state ahead of New York’s 2029 ban on neonicotinoid pesticides in field crops: Side-by-side farm trials of neonic-treated vs. untreated corn showed no difference in yield.

08/20/2026

🦟 Today, August 20, is World Mosquito Day! Take a tour of the Murdock Lab Insectary and learn some fun facts about these tiny creatures and the important research being conducted, from caring for larvae to feeding adult mosquitoes. Special thanks to PhD student Brit Johnson for taking us behind the scenes.
What do we feed our mosquitoes?
Larvae are fed fish food pellets. Adult mosquitoes are fed blood. Depending on the species, this may be cow, chicken, or human blood obtained from a blood bank.

What do we study in our lab?
We investigate how environmental factors, such as temperature and humidity, affect mosquito fitness and their ability to transmit diseases like malaria and dengue.

How long do mosquitoes live?
It depends on the species and their environment. In the wild, mosquitoes typically live for 3 to 4 weeks. In the lab, they can survive for up to 60 days when provided with optimal conditions.

08/10/2026

🐝The Dyce Lab for Honey Bee Studies is hosting our annual honey extraction event! Join us on August 21st from 10AM to 6PM to extract honey, build bird feeders and check out our newly planted pollinator garden.
Where: 201 Freese Rd. Ithaca, NY
When: August 21st, from 10AM to 6PM
BYOJ (bring your own jar)!
We also have Dyce Lab t-shirt, hats, and sticker for sale!🐝
Feel free to send us a DM if you have any questions.

08/07/2026

🐝📕 New Book Alert! Professor Bryan Danfoth and colleagues recently published a book, The Bee Genera of North and Central America (Hymenopters: Apoidea): Second Edition, with Smithsonian Scholarly Publications.
The online (PDF) version is available on the Smithsonian Institution’s Scholarly Press website and can be viewed and downloaded here: https://doi.org/10.5479/si.9781944466909.hc
This book provides a fully updated treatment of the bees of North America, with illustrated keys to the genera, notes on the biology, ecology, and classification of each of the 173 genera, and color habitus photographs of both the male and female of each genus. Smaller, more manageable keys with improved illustrations and images help make the book essential for bee identification by researchers for the foreseeable future. We hope you enjoy it! 🐝

Bryan N. Danforth, Seán G. Brady, Karolyn Darrow, Silas Bossert, Eduardo A. B. Almeida, Jason Gibbs, John L. Neff, Terry Griswold, Laurence Packer, Ronald J. McGinley, and Charles D. Michener