Inner Nature: Rock honeybee encounter in Chennai, India

By Vidya Rajan, Columnist, The Times I am currently in India. My father lives in Chennai, a city on the southeast Bay of Bengal coast, in a flat (apartment) in a tower block. Recently a swarm of honeybees showed up and settled on a large waterpipe that ran above a public stairwell. Anxious that passersby would get stung, a decision was made by the maintenance crew to call in pest control. A previous...

Inner Nature: Poisonous and venomous animals

By Vidya Rajan, Columnist, The Times I am in India. It’s a vibrant and bustling place. This month, a couple of friends and I are planning a trip to a wildlife sanctuary in Southern India*. We hope to see tigers and a plethora of other animals and plants. What I am hoping we do not encounter closely are mosquitoes and snakes. I do not like mosquitoes, but I do like snakes, in principle. But many snakes...

A tale of two countries tells us the vaccine works; get your shot if you haven’t yet

By Mike McGann, Editor, The Times @mikemcgannpa It’s May and flowers (and pollen, achoo) are blooming everywhere in Chester County. You know what else is blooming: optimism that the worst of the COVID-19 is over in our area and we are working our way past this pandemic. If you want a shot, you pretty much can walk up in a number of locations and get one. About 65% of the adult population of the county...