RICHFIELD, Ohio — Dr. Claudia Husseneder of the LSU Agricultural Center’s Department of Entomology was the winner of PCT’s 9th Annual Best Pest Photo Contest with this photo of a southern carpenter bee.

Husseneder, who won $500 for her winning entry, used a Canon EOS 50D camera with a Canon Macro Lens EF 100mm with a Macro Ring Lite MR-14 EX to capture the image. The image was taken from about 30 cm.

“I am reluctant to call these beautiful pollinators ‘pests,’ but many people are afraid of large carpenter bees and, as the name says, carpenter bee females drill into wood to construct their brood galleries,” Husseneder said.

She added she rescued this particular bee from one of her “overly playful” cats. “The bee had been buzzing around my backyard near a partially hollow ligustrum tree (its nesting place?) when the kitty launched at it. For the photo shoot, the stunned model (fortunately for me) was sitting patiently on a black piece of paper on my kitchen table,” she said.

Husseneder said she would consider herself “a passionate amateur of nature photography (mostly birds and bugs).” Previously, she has won several prizes from the Entomological Society of America for her mug shots of insects (“bug shots”).

Husseneder received her M.S. degree in biology (1994) and her Ph.D. in natural sciences (1998) from the Department of Animal Physiology at the University of Bayreuth in Germany. She is an associate professor in the Department of Entomology at the LSU Agricultural Center.

PCT received more than 60 entries in this year’s contest, which a panel of judges reviewed. Click here to see an online photo review that includes the winning photo as well as the 10 finalist photos.