These bugs have excellent taste

Coffee growers in Hawaii County must be relieved to be getting $1 million in federal aid for their fight against the coffee berry borer. That’s even better news for their budgets than the $550,000 appropriated by the state.

The borer, a small beetle that has infested crops since 2010, has been quite an adversary. The University of Hawaii website on the issue lays out strategies for managing the pest. The advice is to avoid leaving berries on the ground lest the bugs burrow in for good, and to use a mesh at the processing mill to catch the adults wiggling out of the harvested fruit.

Yuck. Coffee drinkers have to figure that they’ve ingested some processed bug parts at some point. But the less said about that, the better for the industry.

Take me out to the all-star game

It’s roughly half-time for Major League Baseball’s 162-game regular season, which is marked by two events that promise to be a lot of fun: the annual All-Star Home Run Derby and, of course, the annual All-Star Game.

Both are being held this year at Citi Field in New York, home of the New York Mets — the derby on Monday and the all-star game on Tuesday. At stake in the latter game is who between the contending MLB’s American and National leagues will get home-field advantage in the World Series, which starts in late October.

Unfortunately for local fans, no players with Hawaii roots will be participating, though Maui native Shane Victorino, now with the Boston Red Sox, was in two previous All-Star games and Brandon League, now with the Los Angeles Dodgers, was in one.

Still, the mid-season event should be fun.