The unexpected benefits of taxonomic-collectioning

Mycologists out on a fungal foray (baskets not obligatory). CC MJ Richardson.

  He* who has joined with companions in a botanical party, and with them often visited native spots of beauty, and gathered their treasures, can truly know the feelings of delight that arise in the breast, feelings by no means of an evanescent nature, but lasting during life - and at once recalled by the sight of the specimens which were collected. An occasional glance at a Herbarium, will call forth many a pleasing recollection, many a circumstance otherwise forgotten. One little plant will often tell a tale of adventure, and revive many an agreeable association of persons, places, and incidents.
 Thomas Bruges Flower in 'The Flora of Wiltshire' (Wiltshire Arch. and Nat. Hist. Magazine, v4. 1858) *He probably meant it in a non-gender-specific way really, but it was 1858 so maybe we ought to let him off. (Did you notice has one of those mad Nominative Determinism surnames?)

His point (and mine), is that getting outside and seeing what species are out there (especially in the company of like minded people), can have excellent long-term effects on your state of mind.

I know this collection is one of your assignments (and so you may feel it is only adding to the pressures you are under), but in my own experience I think it has elements which are quite stress-reducing.

I'm a bit of a serial course-taker, and a while ago I was studying part-time over at one of the other campuses. Everything started off very positively, but half-way through I got really confused and anxious about what I was doing (to the point where I'd sometimes avoid coming in, and that, as I'm sure you know, is not a good idea, as speaking to people always helps sort things out. It worked out ok in the end btw). So I think this assignment is good because once you've settled on a group to collect, what you have to do is very well set out. That clarity makes things a bit easier, and causes less stress.

Being outdoors is good for you. CC image John Chroston.

Also, as you're taking an environment-related course, I guess I don't need to labour the point that going outside and wandering about has great benefits for mental wellbeing. It's not just the sunshine (if there is any) and the fresh air. It's that when you notice plants and animals getting on with their own business, it tends to put a refreshed sense of perspective on things. The current political chaos, the looming gas bill, the argument with your flatmate - they seem less important against the grand scheme of things. All that muddle in your brain gets a chance to clear, like silt settling out in a beaker of water. Plus, you can feel extra virtuous, as your wandering about actually counts as studying, so there's no guilt for "wasting time" away from your desk.

A positive element of this assignment is the element of choice. You come to this course with existing interests and prior experiences, and might want to draw on those to inspire which group to choose. You might want to pursue something requiring skills you already have (maybe you enjoy fiddly practical tasks), or that will encourage you to get out to habitats you're interested in. Or, you might want to try something entirely new: don't be deterred by prior ideas of what you're good at, as the human brain is amazingly flexible (at any age!). Have confidence.

I can imagine the mental benefits of going out in a boat (not so confident of a fish's perspective of angling though). This Chinese depiction by Ma Yuan is from 1195AD!

 I hope you'll feel my colleagues and I can provide a supportive environment and you'll find the lab a pleasant retreat in which to work. I think you may also find yourself helping, and being helped by your coursemates, as you learn to find and identify your chosen plants or creatures. This is definitely A Positive Thing too. Yes, you can be competitive in a nerdy I've-got-more-species-than-you sort of way. But this isn't a 'zero-sum game' where one person's success knocks marks off another's work. Co-operatively sharing your new-found skills reinforces your learning (and makes you feel happy too).

Another aspect of 'snailing' or 'ferning' or whatever it is you choose, is it can really take you out of yourself. I mean that focused state of mind when you're entirely engrossed in what you're doing. Maybe it'll happen when you're out searching for specimens, but I definitely experience it when I'm hunched over the microscope in the lab, staring at the keys and scribbling into my notebook. (I recognise it elsewhere from when I'm being arty, drawing and painting - maybe you have your own version too). It happens when you're absorbed in making sketches and descriptions from your own close observations, and checking and comparing the details of your specimen back and forth with the drawings and descriptions in the ID books. You're not thinking about anything else, and it's like a puzzle to be solved. Sometimes you can get cross when you can't work out the final answer, though even then you'll have been usefully observing and recording new and interesting things (in the case of the microscopic worlds of lichens, beetles and so on, probably features you'd never have suspected). But when your efforts result in triumph, and you get a successful identification, then you will feel rightly chuffed, and I think that's a very satisfying sensation.

This isn't your brain on drugs - this is your brain whilst doing your taxonomic collection. Probably.

So, I hope you'll enjoy and value the process of learning during this assignment, and see its own rewards. That you'll be driven (at least partly) by more than handing in the required objects at the end. You can also go on to use your skills for a wider purpose (as you can read about here) - but I will ramble further about that on another occasion.

My new love of seaweed

White Nothe headland (CC Jim Champion)

I had a pleasant week's holiday in Dorset last week. We went looking for fossils on the beach (de rigeur for the 'Jurassic Coast') - and I found the most amazing fossil sea urchin. But also discovered a new interest - seaweed. Yes, you can picture me in an anorak fighting the horizontal rain, stuffing slimy algae into a carrier bag - it's more or less accurate.

It's very interesting embarking on a new group of flora or fauna though. It's interesting how you don't even realise how little you know. I thought 'oh yeah, I know a few seaweeds' - but I don't really. I know as much about seaweeds as a botanist who can distinguish a dandelion from a nettle. But you have to start somewhere. And that's one of the first useful things you can feel your brain doing - noticing that one specimen is different from another, even if you don't know their names.

I soon realised there were a lot of different seaweeds washed up on the beach. And some of them were in a place I'd not thought about before: they were tiny and growing on other seaweeds. I suppose it's like when I first got interested in snails, in that not all UK snails are shaped like the familiar garden snail - some are tall and pointy, some are super tiny, some are even spikey. I like the sensation of a hidden world becoming revealed. Yes, you will become one of the Initiated. (It's surely no worse a use of your brain than knowing all the minutiae of the football league or what the latest technological must-have is, and you could even use your knowledge to help protect the natural world).

Calliblepharis cilliata - how could you not like all those weird eyelashy outgrowths?

Some things, once collected, can be put aside and dealt with at leisure. But seaweed is more needy, as I soon realised, instinctively feeling that leaving it in a plastic carrier bag in a heated house might have led to domestic arguments. So I rinsed it under the tap and improvised some paper to press it between. Some of the specimens survived. But some types decayed because they needed more care (more changes of paper) and I wasn't organised enough to assemble the correct equipment. I don't want you to be in this position, where you make an effort but then it amounts to nothing.

That's one reason why you shouldn't leave all your collecting until the last minute, because it takes time to realise what the best techniques are for dealing with your specimens.

But another reason is that you need some time collecting and observing to start recognising what you've seen already, and to be able to pick out what's new. At first you don't see everything - you can only take in the broad picture, and you'll overlook all sorts of weird and wonderful things. It's that extra stage that can only happen with time really. This is an assigment you can get a good mark on - you just need to give yourself a bit of time to do yourself and it justice. That's my advice.

I bought a new seaweed book. Of course. I should stop spending all my wages on books, but there always seems to be another interesting one to be had. I must realise that owning a book does not equate to knowing or understanding the information in it, though.

My new purchase is 'Seaweeds of Britain and Ireland' (2nd ed.) by Bunker, Brodie, Maggs and Bunker (2017). Keen seaweed student F also has a copy and has apparently been finding it very useful. The photos certainly seem very clear and there's a lot of description and information. I felt a bit overwhelmed thinking about the number of species (the book has over 200 and there are over 600 around the UK - who knew). But they're such beautiful things and I do want to try to recognise a few more than my current paltry efforts. I recommend. You're welcome to come and look at my copy also.

I have been looking at the Seasearch website (the instigators of the book), and if you're keen on diving they run identification courses around the British Isles - the idea being that you can then go out and start recording sea creatures and seaweeds for yourself, or on one of their special survey days. Imagine the fun (if only I could trust myself not to drown).

Endemic snails in Tenerife - you too can find something rather interesting (and not even realise)

Oh to be back in the Tenerife sunshine. Never mind. I guess spring is not far away, and then there will be all sorts of interesting plants and animals to discover in this country. I really hope that you'll be enthused with whatever group you choose, and give yourself enough time to delve into whatever most fires your interest about them, and write about that in your notebook (I hope you find using your notebook in Tenerife has given you some encouragement).

This morning I have been researching which ferns live on the cloud-forested slopes of Anaga (at the north of the island, for those too unfortunate to have been on the fieldtrip). I want to make a guide so perhaps future groups can take quadrats to discover how fern species change along the trail.

I'm getting very drawn in into the world of the fern. Which is a good thing really. And likewise the other day I was inspired to try and identify some empty snail shells I'd spotted on a jaunt to some open ground near the hotel. Here's one of them - it's about the size of a Brown-lipped snail from the UK, but it's got the most amazing ribby sculpture.

I found a list of endemic Tenerifean snails and checking their pictures thought it might be Hemicycla plicaria. (I don't think I've found a list of non-endemic Tenerifean snails. But then again, the vast majority of land snails there are endemic. I guess you don't get a whole lot of genetic interaction between Tenerife and the continent when it comes to snails).

I was pleased enough with this discovery, but then ended up going down a rabbit hole of snail-related information. For one thing, it turns out that this species is really localised and rare - in fact it only lives in the area around Candelaria where we were staying (there's a map here).   It's apparently only within a 10km2 area. And so it gets on the Critically Endangered list of the IUCN.

So that's really amazing isn't it, and goes to show that you never know what you might find. Ironically, when we were about to set foot on the land to have a poke about, a local couple tried to put us off, presumably thinking we would like a nice stroll along the sea front, not a hike over some "waste ground" where they had just allowed their dog to relieve itself. I tried to communicate that we were "looking for animals", but they said there were no animals. How Wrong They Were. We found lizards, geckos, beetles and bugs, birds, - and a critically endangered snail, for goodness sake.

We might not have any endemic snails in the UK. But there are many species you'll never have seen before and will be surprised at. And if you're seeking a different group, who knows what interesting things you might find. Nature doesn't come with massive signposts. You'll definitely find interesting things that other people routinely ignore (to their detriment), and you may even find something very unusual (as this student did).

I hope you get motivated to get stuck in. And please do bring me things, as I'm always interested to see them and will do my best to help you work out how to identify them.

See your specimens afresh using the amazing microscope

Student B and I have spent a very interesting afternoon photographing his wasps and bees using the lovely microscope and its camera. We tried to identify some but I fear my brain is starting to succumb to lack of sunshine - despite taking a walk at lunchtime. We did discover, however, that this amazing creature is one of the Chrysidoidea or Ruby-tailed wasps. There are 31 species in the UK! Who would have thought it. It makes me regret not spending more time searching for insects in the summer.

Look at the iridescence (don't look at the pin, which was a bit of a poor choice, being so enormous compared to the wasp). My boss suggested the vivid metallic colours might be a result of interference. The body is also quite bumpy, which must scatter the light even more and improve the effect? We were wondering why it should be so attractive, when it actually sneaks about parasitising other types of wasp. Who knows.

I haven't got many classes from now until Christmas, so if you want some help with your own samples, or to take some pictures, please do send an email or drop by. A few interesting photos would be great stuck into your notebook and annotated. I'm here until the bitter end, i.e. the week after the end of term.

You too may well find something interesting

Student B's exotic arachnid friend

This time last year I reported on an ex-taxonomic collectioner who had found a very rare and lovely lichen. You see, how many people are actually looking for these things? Not many. Most are watching ITV2 and playing games on their phones. And even the ones who are interested, are generally happy enough to leave their identification at "lichen" or maybe "some sort of Usnea lichen". But (unless it's really difficult to tell and drives you mad) there's much satisfaction to be had from being able to pin down the exact species.

This week, Student B brought in a cute little jumping spider (family Salticidae) which he'd found living somewhere at the zoo. There are 38 species in this country. But it wasn't any of those - it had very distinctive white pedipalps (which it was waving about) and lovely little spots on its abdomen. Not really knowing where to begin as there are a lot of jumping spiders in the world, we both asked on internet forums (I don't think this counts as cheating in this case). And it seems to be Hasarius adansoni, a common-enough creature in warmer parts of the world like Australia and Japan.

Come and use the lovely microscope camera with your finds- drop me an email.

I looked it up on the Spider and Harvestman Recording Scheme website, and they only have 3 records of it in this country (ever), so I am urging Student B to send in his sighting. Maybe it's living everywhere and nobody's noticed - but maybe it's not. Certainly nobody else has ever reported it from Bristol Zoo. So be encouraged - you really can add to the knowledge we have about the species in this country. You don't have to find anything so exotic of course - even reporting common species is important to provide data about how their numbers and distribution might be changing, or the times of the year that they're active. It's all useful and feeds into a bigger picture.


Meanwhile - I had word from an ex collector of bryophytes, Student H. She's currently on a Bog Conservation placement in the Pennines. She's become so enamoured with the mosses there, that she's set up her own Instagram moss page. How cool is that. It makes me feel very happy. Fluffy and feathered creatures already have a lot of supporters. You can make a difference for the more weird and wonderful plants and animals of this country.

The lovely Sphagnum fimbriatum, CC James Lindsay.

I feel like I don't know anything (but that's alright)

A barkfly. Who'd have thought it. CC image S. Rae

 This morning I have been decanting some Tullgren funnel samples into pots for another class. I'm never fully convinced by whether they work, and also the leaf litter that was collected for them was pretty crispy - so the pots aren't exactly overflowing with creatures. But even so, I've spotted things in there that are going to make me look ignorant if someone asks me what they are.

Last year I spent a considerable amount of time swotting up about little soil creatures and making a guide: I learnt about things I had no idea existed (Protura, Symphyla) and realised I knew close to nothing about the groups I did recognise (Millipedes, Centipedes). And then today I ruefully realised that there are many many more things I don't know about that might be in those pots (Barkflies, Thrips... who knows) and I'm not going to become an expert before next week's class. Much as I'd like to be, for the students' sake as well as my own.

But this is not a reason to give up, is it. It's a reason to start. The world is full of amazing things. You can go and look for them and dip your toe into understanding how the world works. Knowing what's out there and where it is, underpins any scientific research in ecology and conservation.

Polyxenus lagurus, a perfectly common UK millipede. Who knew. CC image Andy Murray.

I also find it quite good for existential angst, as all those plants and creatures are out there doing their thing regardless. That's quite reassuring when you get depressed by the absurdity of your own species (from international politics, to celebrity 'culture', to daft things happening in your own social sphere, to your own behaviour).

So my point is, don't be daunted by feeling you don't know anything at the start of this assignment. Ok, maybe some people know a little. You might fear they know a lot. But it's not a 'zero sum game' as they say - their knowledge isn't going to make yours less, and in fact I can tell you from experience that people are very generous in sharing their skills. Pick something you think you'll find interesting, and dive in. Rome wasn't built in a day (and all that). Remember that all those admirable experts started with a single beetle, or wild flower, or barkfly, once upon a time. Begin now.

Charles Darwin age 7. Painted by Ellen Sharples in 1816.

P.S. A ridiculous and authentic post script.
I spent some of the lesson staring down a microscope with student J, trying to work out what the tiny 4-winged, long-antennaed creature in the petri dish was. In retrospect I think it was a bark fly, though this definitely didn't occur to me at the time. It's a shame isn't it. I can only trust that your young flexible brains will cotton on to things much faster. Here's a gallery of them so I don't get confused next time.

Welcome, neophyte taxonomists

An adult Vallonia costata (only 2mm across). You'll discover things you didn't know existed. CC Nefronus.

  Heaps of people over the years have said to me this was their favourite assignment. I think it's because it gives you the opportunity to develop a genuine 'natural history' type skill - not only the sort of thing that will impress if you go for an ecological job, but also something you can get personal satisfaction from, when you start to recognise (and indeed, start to really See) the plants and animals around you. Maybe an interest in this sort of thing might have been behind you choosing an environmental course in the first place.

I always tell people to Begin Now - but it's really useful to take some time first to think what you might like to collect. If you find this difficult, think about what you might not want to do, and whittle away the options from the other end. Some people might have an existing interest, or a natural preference for animals or plants. (Not all animal-collecting necessitates death, by the way - you could choose snails and other molluscs and just collect empty shells). Some groups necessitate travel (don't choose seaweed if you can't easily get to the sea...) and most do benefit from visiting a range of habitats. But if you can't get far out of Bristol, some options are still very do-able.

Some nice maritime lichen I saw on the Cornwall field trip this year

Specimens of some groups are harder to find than others; some are seasonal (it's already too late really for grasses and Asteraceae). Some are easy enough to collect and preserve, but need more time to identify (like mosses, lichens and spiders). Some need identifying quickly before important features fade (like mushrooms) whereas others can be pored over at leisure (snails). Some need preserving quickly before they cause smells your housemates will complain about (seaweed). Don't waste your efforts - make sure you know the correct preservation technique for your group before you go out collecting!

If you like squinting down a microscope (and I do), then that's essential for some groups but not others. I enjoy the nerdy puzzle-solving of identifying a beetle from a key riddled with long words. I also enjoy looking at the amazing and unexpected detail of lichens, beetles, spiders, mosses (indeed anything) under the microscope.

Many ground beetles are still active over winter. Carabus violaceous CC by Monika Betley.

 Some groups (like beetles) have many many species in this country - and it's literally a lifetime's work to become an expert - but you can start with just a few. Other groups have a limited number of British options and you can soon feel like you're getting to grips with them, though you might find you have to go out of your way to get the less common specimens that will get you a distinguished mark (trees and ferns maybe).

I hope you'll feel motivated to discover more about the species you find, and go out of your way to find more than just the 'minimum required': I hope you enjoy learning something new, and get a good mark too. The 'useful overview' on the left explains the basic elements of the assignment, and you can pick through the list of options under it. The 'cloud' on the right has all my waffling thoughts (among which are helpful hints I hope). But please feel free to contact me - send me an email or drop by to OJ16.

Your new skills can help make a difference

A lot of moths visiting a trap in Brunei, 1982. CC image Accassidy.

The other afternoon I was listening to Inside Science on Radio 4, and they had a piece about 'moth snowstorms'. That is, people were remembering when they would drive along in the countryside at night, and moths would be flying in from all angles into their headlights, and they'd have to start their windscreen wipers. It's certainly not something I've experienced in my lifetime. In fact it seems quite a mad idea, even though it must have been unremarkable not so long ago. Something that did ring a bell was motorcyclists saying they used to have to stop regularly and clean their visors of squashed flies. I can remember (in the 90s) saying to my dad that my friend's car was covered in gummy dead insects, and him complaining that it must have meant we were driving too fast. Some people suggest cars might be more aerodynamic these days, which might account for why gummy insects don't seem to be a problem. But that doesn't explain the visor thing - there'd still be insects on visors.

My point is, we seem to be losing insects, fast. Data from amateur entomologists' malaise traps suggest a loss of 75% in the last 25 years. I don't need to tell you that sounds pretty terrifying, when insects are a fundamental part of the food chain and pollinate a lot of plants (including our food plants). It was astoundingly refreshing to hear that the alleged environment minster, Michael Gove, has actually come round to the idea that neonicotinoid pesticides need stricter controls. One can only hope it's not shutting the door after the horse has bolted. You'd imagine spraying pesticides all over fields can't have helped matters, in addition to problems caused by other modern farming methods. So perhaps stopping spraying them might help restore some of the invertebrate populations.

A malaise trap. CC image Ceuthophilus. Nothing to do with uneasy-feeling malaise (though that may be for the insects), but actually invented by the Swedish Mr. Malaise in the 1930s.

Whilst this sounds like environmental doom and gloom (which yes, it probably is) - you have chosen this degree course so presumably want to try to make the world a better place. You can be part of the antidote to your own gloom. By developing your identification skills and submitting records to recording schemes and records centres, you can help make some difference. Your data can feed into a big picture which can persuade the powers that be to actually do something. This might not be a straightforward process because it involves politics. But having the scientific evidence has to be of critical importance, surely.

You might think "ah, what difference can I make? :( " But there really aren't that many people out there who have good identification skills. Particularly if you focus on something even slightly obscure. If you chose to go to a local habitat and record what you find, it's possible that nobody would have done that for ten, twenty years (or even ever). You might find something Really Interesting, and conceivably that could help get the site a modicum of protection one day. And even if you don't, it all becomes part of valuable data about today, and can be compared with what happens in future, and if records exist, with what was present in the past. (iRecord is an easy way to submit a record of anything you find, but if you prefer the support of a specialist scheme, the Biological Records Centre has a comprehensive list of contacts.)

Student A's lovely lichen find. CC image Jason Hollinger (California)

The other day, one of the third years popped in to see me. She chose lichens for her collection last year and got really into them. She'd been out lichen-hunting recently. When she got home and looked in her 'Dobson' guide, one of them seemed to be something unusual. The only species that seemed to match was a distinctive orange-grey lichen with little eyelashy spines around the fruiting bodies. But Dobson said it had only been seen in very few areas and was now thought extinct in this country. She had a tiny sample and we both squinted at it down the microscope. Nothing else seemed to match. I said I thought she should speak to David Hill, my esteemed lichen tutor from my course.

It turns out she was right with her identification and he was "super excited". Isn't that amazing! So this is proof that you too can find and report something excellent. She's brought something back from apparent extinction. I guess the poor lichen was never quite extinct in the first place (though it's evidently very rare) - but the point is, how many people are looking at lichens, and how many people have the skill to identify them? Not many. So your developing skills can make an impact. You can be one of an elite group that is knowledgeable and enthusiastic about lichens, beetles, mosses, or whatever it is that grabs you. We can only conserve things when we know they exist. You will be able to contribute to the body of knowledge of what's out there. Be encouraged.

There are links to over 200 recording schemes at the NBN Gateway.