Tag Archives: animals

Awesome Entomology – USA Edition!

Between January – April 2017 I was lucky to couch surf in San Francisco, so I decided to volunteer in the Entomology Collections at the California Academy of Sciences !

I worked with Brian Fisher and Jenna Florio in the Entomology department, and I was predominantly working on two citizen science projects in collaboration with the Tsutsui Lab at UC Berkeley.

These new citizen science projects were looking at insect communities in California; including “Pools Project” and “Antvasion!”. The “Pools Project” surveyed the insects in pools of participants, specimens were sent to the museum where I identified the insects/invertebrates to order and the ants to species using a key to the ants of California and antweb. “Antvasion” was a citizen science project which looked at the ants which are specifically found in peoples homes, with emphasis on the distribution and biology of the Argentine ants. We prepared and delivered “natural deterrents” including cinnamon, cayenne pepper and black pepper to participants to see if it would deter the pests.

I also helped to set up a stall for the weekly museum event called “nightlife” where I did talks to the public about entomology collections, ecology, ants and pest management, encouraging them to take part in the few practical activities we have set up at the table, including correctly handling and observing behaviour of argentine ants.  As well as this, I did a presentation on “Women in Science” about becoming an entomologist.

A Taste of Taiwan

The biggest mistake in the decisions I made whilst traveling was to spend only 8 days in Taiwan. Little did I know that it is an absolute gem, not only for its stunning natural history but also the friendly and welcoming people, and delicious food…

I was lucky enough to spend a day walking in Taroko National Park where I learned about the beautiful marble geology of the Taroko gorge.

After visiting Taroko, I went to 忘憂森林 in Nantou. It is known as the misty lotus forest – which was surrounded by tea plantations and a very peculiar swamp forest at the top of a very steep hill. Some referred to it as the daemon forest but I am not sure if that is its actual name.

 
Hopefully, I will return to this wonderful country again in the future.
 

Dreams do Come True: Tropical Ecology Research in Borneo!

When I was leaving Maliau Basin in 2015 after completing the data collection for my masters project, I did not think I would have the opportunity to return to Borneo any time soon… I was wrong!

Between September – December 2016 I went back to the beautiful pristine rainforests surrounding Maliau Basin in Borneo, this time, as an ecological field research assistant with the Natural History Museum, I worked with the Termite Ant Research Team which includes Paul Eggleton, Louise Ashton, in collaboration with the University of Liverpool’s Kate Parr, Hannah Griffiths and Alice Walker.

I spent half my time in the rainforest collecting data from fieldwork including:

  1. Termite transects
  2. Leaf litter transects/Winkler Bag sampling
  3. Ant bait card monitoring
  4. Predation study on fake grublets
  5. Wood occupancy surveys
  6. Hand collecting 2,000 individual ants for molecular gut content analysis
  7. Ant resource removal experiment

The other half of my time was spent in the Laboratory in the Institute of Tropical Biology and Conservation (ITBC) at the University of Malaysia, Sabah (UMS) in Kota Kinabalu working in the Natural Products Chemistry laboratory where I extracted chemicals from soil and seedling samples. I also helped the UMS Friends of Borneensis Outreach Initiative to design a field course for Malaysian School Students in 2017.

Our resource removal experiment revealed that Ants are the major agents of resource removal from tropical rainforests and was published recently in the Journal of Animal Ecology.

Drying and Weighing Soil Samples at UMS
Extracting chemicals from seedlings from all of the plots
Topographic representation of Maliau Basin and all of the camp sites
Maliau Basin Field Studies Centre
Cookenia spp. Fungus
Dicuspiditermes nemorosus termite mound growing out of a buttress root
Preparing fake grublets made out of plasticine to look at predation
Hospitalitermes sp. Termite Foraging Column
Hospitalitermes sp. Termite Foraging Column
Hospitalitermes sp. Termite Foraging Column
Hospitalitermes sp. Termite Foraging Column
Dysphania subrepleta (Day flying geometrid obtaining salts from civet poo)
Fieldwork
Catterpillar – potentially irritating to the skin
Microcerotermes dubius arboreal termite nest
Spooning trees?
Coleoptera
Plasticine grublet under the microscope. Can you identify the bite marks?
Termites
View over Maliau Brigde
Chalcosoma moellenkempi
View from the research station
Walk towards field sites
Mailau river
Forest trees
Mailau Basin Field Studies Centre

In Sulawesi, as an Entomologist!

During the field seasons of 2012 and 2013 I was the entomology team leader at Operation Wallacea, Indonesia. The country of Indonesia is a huge country made up of around 18,000 islands across 5,000km. With a population of around 260 million people, and an incredible diversity of approximately 730 different languages. It is unsurprising, therefore, that the island biogeography provides a hot-house for speciation in this tropical island region with an incredible examples of adaptation and endemism. The Wallacea region, named after the famous naturalist Alfred Russel Wallace

I worked in the main base for the university students doing the jungle training course, and the starting point for school students in south Buton is the village of Labundo. I conducted lepidoptera pollard surveys, banana baited bottle canopy arthropod surveys and Dung beetle surveys in both natural habitats and disturbed agricultural ecosystems. As well as this, I conducted rapid biodiversity assessment of termites using the standard transect method.