Ticks in pictures

Some more about ticks.  No, not The Tick comic or the movie Ticks … both may be entertaining, but they feature completely inaccurate depictions of ticks.

Let’s talk about real ticks:  Ticks are rather large mites. To demonstrate this, here is a family portrait:

family portrait of Ixodes pacificus, California Dept. of Public Health

Family portrait of Ixodes pacificus, California Dept. of Public Health [public domain]

From left to right, larva (6 legs), nymph (8 legs), male and female of Ixodes pacificus, the Western black-legged tick, from the west coast (you can see them with the naked eye, therefore they are big).

All members of the family feed on host blood using highly modified mouthparts, but only larvae, nymphs, and females engorge (feed to the point where their body truly swells up).

close-up of mouth parts of Amblyomma extraoculatum, U.S. National Tick Collection (USNMENT00956315)

Close-up of mouth parts of Amblyomma extraoculatum, U.S. National Tick Collection (USNMENT00956315)

Here are some nice examples of engorged females.  Keep in mind that while engorged ticks are easy to find, they are often difficult to identify.

Most of the ticks we encounter in Ohio have females that feed only once.  They engorge, convert all that host blood into a single mass of hundreds to thousands of eggs, and die.

tick with eggs (c) Univ. Nebraska, Dept. Entomology

Tick with eggs, Univ. Nebraska, Dept. Entomology

Ticks in general get really bad press.  Kind of sad, because ticks are very good at quite a few things, like surviving (some can survive hours under water or years without food), or manipulating your immune system (using a dizzying array of chemicals often found only in ticks). On second thought, that may not strike most people as positive, so let me end with a few pictures of beautiful creatures. I already introduced Amblyomma americanum, which occurs in Ohio, the others are African, A. chabaudi on tortoises in Madagascar, A. variegatum usually on cattle. Amblyomma variegatum is the main vector of heartwater, a disease making cattle herding impossible in parts of Africa, but still, very pretty.

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See some more of these specimens close-up, but at a safe distance through microscopes at our Annual Open House, April 22, 2017.

 

Dr. Hans Klompen, Professor EEOBiology at OSUAbout the Author: Dr. Hans Klompen is professor in the department of Evolution, Ecology and Organismal Biology and director of the Ohio State University Acarology Collection.

*** Which of these ticks is your “favorite”? Let us know on Facebook ***

 

Know your ticks: Ohio

Daffodils are in bloom, students walk around in shorts and T-shirts, so it must be the beginning of tick season.  And indeed, the first ticks are out and questing (= searching for a host). This might be a good time to talk about ticks in Ohio.  Ohio is not a major center for tick diversity, but it has some diversity.  Most people only know the three main people biters, Dermacentor variabilis (American dog tick), Amblyomma americanum (lone star tick), and Ixodes scapularis (deer tick), so let’s start with these:

Dermacentor variabilis is perhaps the most widespread and common tick in Ohio.  Immatures feed on rodents and other small animals, but adults feed on medium (opossums, raccoons, dogs) to large (humans) mammals.  Of the “big three” this species is the most tolerant of drying out, and the most likely to be encountered in open areas.  The main activity period for adults is mid-April – mid-July.  D. variabilis is the vector of, among others, Rocky Mountain Spotted Fever (RMSF) and tularemia.  Columbus used to be a focal area for RMSF, but the disease is less common now.  D. variabilis may also cause tick paralysis, although less frequently than the related D. andersoni from the Rocky Mountains region.

American dog tick

Dermacentor variabilis American dog tick

Amblyomma americanum used to be uncommon in southern Ohio, but has increased in numbers and range over the last decades.  This is part of a general trend.  In the eastern U.S., this species is rapidly expanding its range northwards.  All instars, larva, nymph, and adult feed on mid-size to large animals, incl. humans.  Like D. variabilis, females can deposit very large clutches of eggs, but in this case the resulting larvae often stay together.  If you are unlucky and step close to a mass of these “seed ticks”, you may be attacked by hundreds of ticks simultaneously.  These ticks are active in all warm months of the year.  Unlike D. variabilis, “Lone stars” are not common in open areas, preferring more shady and humid sites.  For a long time A. americanum was listed as vectoring few human diseases, but it has now been identified as vector of human monocytic ehrlichiosis and STARI, and possibly tularemia and Q-fever.

lone star tick

Amblyoma americanum lone star tick

Ixodes scapularis appears to be an even more recent resident.  This species was rare or absent in Ohio before 2010, but has now been found in a majority of Ohio counties.  The reason for this sudden expansion is unclear.  This is a relatively small species.  Larvae can be found in summer, nymphs late summer, and adults in fall and early spring.  Immatures tend to feed on smaller sized hosts, e.g. rodents, small birds, while adults prefer larger hosts, such as deer.  However, all instars may attach to humans.  Nymphs are considered the most problematic: they are small (thus often undetected), and can be infected with e.g. Lyme disease (unlike the even smaller larvae).  Like A. americanum, this species prefers shady, humid environments.  New subdivisions build in forests, resulting in large amounts of forest edges with lots of deer, have been a very good habitat for this tick in New England.  Ixodes scapularis has become famous as the vector for, among others, Lyme disease, human granulocytic anaplasmosis, and babesiosis.  Co-infection is common in New England and appears to result in increased pathology.

deer tick

Ixodes scapularis deer tick

So much for the common people biters.  It is important to note that most species of tick rarely if ever bite people.  They prefer different, usually smaller, hosts.  For example, Rhipicephalus sanguineus, the brown dog tick prefers feeding on dogs.  It is one of the few species that may occur indoors in dog kennels etc.  Haemaphylis leporispalustris appears to be specialized on hares and rabbits.  Several Ixodes species, I. cookei, I. dentatus, I. kingi, I. marxi, can be found on small to medium sized mammals, often associated with nests or burrows.  Finally, the so-called soft ticks, family Argasidae, are represented by only a single species in Ohio, Carios kelleyi, primarily found in bat colonies.

Find out more about the ticks’ life cycles and their diseases.

Dr. Hans Klompen, Professor EEOBiology at OSUAbout the Author: Dr. Hans Klompen is professor in the department of Evolution, Ecology and Organismal Biology and director of the Ohio State University Acarology Collection.

 

*** Have you found a tick yet this spring? send us a photo of your specimen on Facebook! ***

 

Examples of type specimens in the OSU herbarium

After reading Monday’s post on type specimens in The OSU herbarium, I wanted to see some of these type specimens, and so, I set up an appointment with Mesfin Tadesse, curator of vascular plants in the herbarium. Mesfin led me straight to the cabinet that houses all type specimens, each in its own red folder. He pulled out the following type specimens, some of which were collected in Ohio.

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I was curious to find out more about these specimens and hence I looked up the labels and the notes left with the specimens. While the labels were provided by the plant collectors, the notes, on the nature of the type, were supplied, at a later time, either by curators or by students who were working towards a Ph.D. degree in plant systematics at the time.

The Red Maple variety viride was collected at Buckeye Lake, Licking county, in 1917, by Freda Detmers, an American botanist.  She knew that the species of Acer are quite variable and she described and named this new variety based on “a young tree, about 9.5 m. tall with smooth light gray bark” that she found on  Cranberry Island in Buckeye Lake. You can see a photograph of the tree posted with the type specimen. She published her description in the Ohio Journal of Science 19: 235-236.

The variety subinermis of the Devil’s Walkingstick Aralia spinosa was described by Harold Moldenke, another American botanist / txaonomist. He collected this particualr specimen as an escape from cultivation along a fence, North Appalachian Experimental Watershed, near Coshocton, Coshocton Co., Ohio, on July 25, 1942. It was originally deposited in the herbarium of the North Appalachian Experimental Watershed which was transferred to the OSU herbarium at a later time. He gave the original description in Latin which was the norm until very recently: Haec forma a forma typica speciei recedit petiolis rhachidibusque costisque foliolorum inermibus; caulibus ramisque subinermibus vel paullo armatis (in case you are not fluent in Latin, check the translation at the bottom of this post).

Of course I was intrigued by my name’s sake California Angelica Angelica callii, a plant collected at an elevation of 4,600 feet near Sequoia National Park on 18 October 1965 (almost to the date and 10 years before I was born). The plant was so named in honor of Tracey and Viola Call, the collectors of the type specimens deposited both in the University of California Herbarium (UC: holotype) and in The Ohio State University Herbarium (OS: isotype).

map with exact location marked where the isotype specimen for Angelica callii was found in 1965

Exact location where the isotype specimen for Angelica callii was found in 1965

The map shows the exact location of where this isotype specimen of Angelica callii was found.

Did you know that the tree houseleek is a succulent, subtropical plant? The holotype held at the OSU herbarium was collected in the Canary Islands in 1984.

The description and the wonderful drawing of the variety of maidenhair fern Adiantum pedatum var. laciniatum was published in the 10th volume of the Ohio Naturalist in 1910. Lewis Sylvester Hopkins – you guessed right – another American botanist, described this variety as follows: “For several years while collecting in the woods of Wayne County, Ohio, I have noted here and there occasional plants of Adiantum pedatum L. whose fronds [another term for a fern’s leaf consisting of multiple leaflets] differ very materially from those of the normal type. The difference consists mainly in the normal pinnules [any of the smaller leaflets into which each leaflet of a compound leaf is subdivided] being replaced by linear branching pinnules which are partly fertile and partly sterile at their tips. This transposition may occur either at the end or in the middle of the pinna, more often the latter.

One of these plants was transplanted to the yard of the McFadden homestead in Wooster where it has been under observation for a period of four years. It seems to thrive in its new home and each year has continued to produce fronds of the type described.

The form is probably a sport [slang for a genetic mutant or variant] but as such it seems to deserve a name as it is likely to occur elsewhere. Therefore, I propose the name: Adiantum pedatum L. var. laciniatum Hopkins var. nov.”

Last but not least the oppositeleaf spotflower Acmella oppsitifolia var. repens as described by Robert K Jansen in his article “The Systematics of Acmella (Asteraceae-Heliantheae)” in Systematic Botany Monographs, Vol. 8 in 1985. I will leave the description for you to figure out: “Outer and inner series of phyllaries lanceolate, apex acuminate. Ray and disc achenes sparsely to densely ciliate with short (30-50 µm) straight-tipped hairs; pappus absent. Chromosome number n = 26.

Phenology. Flowering commonly from April to November, except in Florida where the flowering season extends throughout the year.

distribution map of Acmella oppsitifolia var repens

distribution map of Acmella oppsitifolia var repens

Distribution. In moist, weedy habitats, especially along roadsides and stream banks on the Coastal Plain of the southeastern United States (i.e., Alabama, Florida, Georgia, and North and South Carolina) and along the Mississippi River from southern Mississippi to southern Louisiana; sea level to 200 m.

This variety has also spread west and south into western Arkansas and eastern Texas; one disjunct population is known from northern Mexico.”

The neotype specimen in The OSU herbarium was collected in Texas.

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Here are some definitions that may make it easier for you to appreciate the terminology taxonomists use when describing type specimens:

Protologue = Everything associated with a name at its valid publication, i.e. description or diagnosis, illustrations, references, synonymy, geographical data, citation of specimens, discussion, and comments.

Holotype = The one specimen or illustration used by the author or designated by the author as the nomenclatural type.

Paratype = A specimen cited in the protologue that is neither the holotype nor an isotype, nor one of the syntypes if two or more specimens were simultaneously designated as types.

Neotype = A specimen or illustration selected to serve as nomenclatural type if no original material is extant or as long as it is missing.

Isotype = A duplicate specimen of the holotype.

References:  Glossary of terms used and defined in the International Code of Botanical Nomenclature

The University and Jepsen Herbaria specimen portal, University of California, Berkeley (map of Angelica callii)

Original descriptions of these type specimens have been published in the following journals:
Acer rubrum: Detmers F (1918). Two new varieties of Acer rubrum L. The Ohio Journal of Science 19: 235-236.
Acmella oppsitifolia: Jansen RK (1985). The Systematics of Acmella (Asteraceae-Heliantheae). Systematic Botany Monographs, Vol. 8: 1-115.
Adiantum pedatum: Hopkins LS (1910). New varieties of common ferns. The Ohio Naturalist 10: 179-180.
Aeonium davidbramwellii: Liu, H.-Y. (1989). Systematics of Aeonium (Crassulaceae). National Museum of Natural Science (Taiwan) Special Publication 3: 88-89, Fig.29
Angelica callii: (1977). Madrono 24:80.
Aralia spinose: Moldenke HN (1944). A Contribution to Our Knowledge of the Wild and Cultivated Flora of Ohio: I. Castanea, Vol. 9, No. 1/3 (Jan. – Mar., 1944), pp. 1-80

About the Author: Angelika Nelson is the outreach and multi-media coordinator at the Museum of Biological Diversity, on a mission in the OSU herbarium. Mesfin Tadesse edited the text.

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Here is the translation of the Latin description of Aralia spinosa var. subinermis by Harold Moldenke: This form differs from the typical form of the species in having its petioles, rachis, and the midribs of the leaflets unarmed and the trunk and branches practically unarmed or with only comparatively few thorns – just what you thought, right?

Vascular Plant Type Specimens in The Ohio State University Herbarium

Today we introduce type specimens kept in The Ohio State University Herbarium. But first let us briefly introduce the herbarium and what a type specimen of a plant is.

The Ohio State University Herbarium was established in 1891, 21 years after the founding of the university. Since its inception, the vascular plant collections [all seed-bearing plants and ferns], as well as the non-vascular plant collections [mosses and liverworts], have grown rapidly through the efforts of the many plant collectors from Ohio and beyond, and through gifts, exchanges and purchases. The total holdings of vascular plants are estimated at over 550,000 specimens. The collection, having been built up over a period of nearly 126 years, is a state treasure. It continues to be augmented and studied by many experts interested in various groups of plants as well as in some aspects of Ohio vegetation. The herbarium preserves specimens as vouchers to document past and present research studies on vegetation. Such documentation may increase the value of the research study by making it possible for future workers to determine, without any doubt, what plants were used in the original research. An important special case of this is the preservation of specimens of the original plant material that was used to describe and give a name to a new species or sub-specific entity. These are called type specimens and are often simply called “types”. They are specimens on which the naming of plants and plant populations (as variety or subspecies)  are based, and in a sense they serve as the key to the name of a plant. In the event of any discrepancy between independent descriptions of a species or any element of it, now or in the past, researchers can go back to the type specimen, and clarify the matter. For this reason, type specimens are among the most valuable entities in any collection, including the OSU herbarium. The effort is to have only a single type specimen for each name associated with a plant or its population, although in the past, that is, before the adoption of the type concept, many specimens were often used to describe and name a particular plant species.

Because of their value, type specimens are given special care by curators of herbaria. Since a while back an active search has been conducted to find and remove type specimens from the OSU collection for storage in a special cabinet (see photo).  Currently over 470 sheets representing more than 100 vascular plant taxa have been confirmed as type specimens and photographs of types in our collection. Type specimens along with type photographs are, therefore, treasures of all times. Their preservation and safety is one of the priorities in the herbarium. Type specimens are kept in a separate and special case. This precludes unnecessary handling and permits more adequate inspection for possible harm (e.g. insect infestation). The case containing type specimens is placed on a wheeled cart with a sign “TYPE COLLECTION REMOVE FIRST IN CASE OF FIRE” consequently it’s easy to take it out first or quickly, during an emergency.

A greater and more tragic loss of literally thousands of type specimens resulted from the partial burning of the great herbarium at Berlin, The Federal Republic of Germany, in 1943. Type specimens are not, and should not, be used or handled any more than is necessary. Curators of many herbaria are reluctant to send out type specimens on loan to other botanists or institutions. They insist that researchers must first attempt at establishing identities of their research materials with the help of protologues (all original materials associated with a newly published name, including its description, diagnosis, illustrations, synonyms, studied specimens, etc.), the original species description, and the available electronic images of many types in databases of institutions and herbaria.  It is only after these have failed and that the researcher is in dire need of examining particular details of these types, that they are willing to send types on loan. In our previous post, we illustrated how the type specimen of the Ohio Buckeye was brought, not sent by mail, to Ohio from Berlin. Part of the agreement with the Berlin herbarium then was that it will have to be taken from Berlin and sent back to Berlin with a staff member of the department, thus indicating the level of care that the institution placed on its type collections. Today, many of the type specimens kept in The Ohio State University Herbarium are available for viewing online through Global Plants, the world’s largest database of digitized plant specimens. Researchers are encouraged to check this and similar websites first in order to examine a type  specimen, be it from Ohio or elsewhere.

We will show you more samples of type specimens and how researchers make these first descriptions on Friday!

 

Mesfin Tadesse, curator OSU herbariumAbout the Authors: Mesfin Tadesse is curator of vascular plants at Ohio State University Herbarium; Azam Abdollahazadeh is a Research Scholar on a short-term visit to the OSU herbarium.

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Knull, the artist


As we discussed in our previous post, Josef Knull was well-recognized as a curator, a collector, and as an expert in wood-boring beetles. As a taxonomist he studied and described new genera and many new species of beetles in various families.

However, there’s another side of Joe Knull that hasn’t gotten the same attention: his talent as an artist. While moving some old books around the other day, we found a few pieces of what looks like a poster presentation by Joe Knull that provides information on how to draw on Ross board.  This is a textured scratch board for making drawings. A skilled artist, by varying the intensity of shading and, hence, accentuating the texture on the Ross board, can practically bring a two-dimensional drawing to life! According to Chuck Triplehorn, Joe was proficient in various drawing techniques and was particularly good at indicating shape and surface texture through the use of stippling.


Joe’s 1924 Master’s thesis (archived in the OSU Library holdings) contains a number of detailed illustrations of beetle species found in Pennsylvania. Here are some photos of the original plates.

 

Many of Joe’s publications contain original illustrations of specimens, signed with a simple and elegant ‘J.N.K.’ For example, “A new species of Mecas in Texas” includes a beautiful drawing of Mecas linsleyi and “A New Subspecies of Acmaeodera Quadrivittata Horn” a drawing of Acmaeodera quadrivittata cazie. For those interested in seeing more of Joe Knull’s scientific illustrations, PDFs of his publications are available in the Ohio Journal of Science via the OSU’s Knowledge Bank.


We never met Joe Knull in person. Chuck Triplehorn mentions Joe’s wry sense of humor, but overall our image of him was that of a tough, strict, mostly surly kind of guy. That is, until we saw his paintings, the ones he did for fun. There’s a certain vulnerability and playfulness that we did not associate with Knull before and that is very refreshing. There’s certainly more to Joe, as to most of us, than the work we do.

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We thank Sally Wilson, Dorothy J. Knull’s nice, for the photos of Joe Knull’s paintings. She tells us that the paintings hang on her grandsons’ walls.


References:

☘ Knull, J. N. 1924. The Buprestidae of Pennsylvania. Thesis. The Ohio State University.

 

About the Authors: Dr. Luciana Musetti is an Entomologist and Curator of the Triplehorn Insect Collection; Dr. Norman Johnson is Professor of Entomology and Director of the Triplehorn Insect Collection.

The Knull Legacy

For the past several weeks, Zach Griebenow (undergraduate student assistant, blogger, majoring in Entomology), and I, with some help from Abbie Zimmer (volunteer, majoring in Art) and Dr. Natalia Molotievskiy, have been reorganizing the beetle holdings of the Triplehorn collection to reflect the changes in the classification of the Coleoptera at the superfamily and family levels (per Bouchard et al., 2011).  This is a laborious process that involves moving (almost) all of the 1,629 (heavy!) wooden drawers containing beetles. On any given day we may move 100-200 drawers in a couple of hours. We are now more than two-thirds of the way done and hope to finish ‘the big switcheroo’ in 2-3 weeks. This re-organization is a big step, and it will greatly facilitate the next phase of the re-curation and digitization of the beetles in the collection.

As we worked, moving drawers in and out of tall metal cabinets, I had a chance to look at the contents of the collection again, not with the critical eye of the professional whose job is to upgrade the curatorial status of it, but with the eye of the student who was seeing it for the first time. This rekindled my appreciation for Joe Knull’s work and his dedication to the collection.

Josef N. Knull

Josef N. Knull

For those unfamiliar with the Triplehorn Insect Collection’s history, Josef Nissley Knull (1891-1975) was hired in 1934 as the full-time curator of insects, and that marks the initiation of a formal entomological collection at Ohio State.

Joe Knull was notoriously meticulous in his care for the collection. He was held up by most entomologists across the country as the extreme example of tidiness and organization. We still have many drawers of beetles that were arranged by him: long series of accurately determined, properly mounted, neatly positioned, and perfectly preserved specimens. There are many stories about Joe’s strict rules in the collection: no smoking, no whistling, no careless people, absolutely no breaking specimens. He allegedly kept a list of all the people who broke specimens. Unfortunately, we have no hard evidence that this list existed, but those who knew him say it would be very much like Joe to do that.

For 28 ½ years Professor Knull devoted his career to the expansion and arrangement of the collection. Each summer of all those years, and those afterward during his retirement, was spent in the field with his wife and fellow entomologist, Dr. Dorothy Johnson Knull. Both were outstanding collectors, and the results of their efforts are reflected in the volume and diversity of material they added to the collection.

Joe was interested in all insects, but he was dedicated to the study of beetles. He published more than 190 papers between 1918 and 1975, particularly on the families Buprestidae, Cerambycidae, Elateridae and Cleridae (Davidson & Bellamy, 2002). The many years of field work with emphasis on beetles, particularly in the Midwestern and  Southwestern states, resulted in a truly outstanding collection of North American Coleoptera.

Professor Josef Knull retired from OSU in January of 1962, but continued collecting and contributing to the OSU collection until the early 1970’s. He died, here in Columbus, on April 24, 1975 at the age of 83. His legacy lives on in every publication generated by the use of the specimens he so carefully collected and preserved, in every visit the collection receives by scientists from the US and abroad, in every specimen image we make available online, in every database query of the 148,154 beetle specimens we have already digitized.

We started re-curating the beetles in 2011. To date, the Carabidae, all 41,466 of them, have been moved to archival quality trays and entirely digitized. Our student assistants are now deep into the digitization of the Tenebrionidae, a whopping 65,150 specimens.  Our volunteers are helping with collection organization. As we continue on with the task of re-curating and digitizing this vast beetle collection (estimated at around 1 million specimens), we keenly feel the responsibility of living up to Joe’s high standards of collection care. I hope he would approve of our work.

Check out the collection’s Facebook page for more photos of Joe Knull and other personalities in our history.

If you are interested in learning more about our work, or would like to volunteer to help us tackle this enormous project, please get in touch.

 

References:

☘ Davidson, J. M. & C. L. Bellamy. 2002. The Entomological Contributions of Josef Nissley Knull (1891 – 1975). Zootaxa 37: 1-24.

☘ Bouchard et al. 2011. Family-Group Names In Coleoptera (Insecta). ZooKeys 88: 1-972. https://doi.org/10.3897/zookeys.88.807

☘ An earlier version of this article appeared in the MBDNewsletter Spring Semester 2013, page 4.  Johnson & Musetti. The Knull Legacy – Joe Knull.

For more about Zach Griebenow, read his interview to Paige Brown Jarreau at From the Lab Bench blog.

 

About the Authors: Dr. Luciana Musetti is an Entomologist and Curator of the Triplehorn Insect Collection; Dr. Norman Johnson is Professor of Entomology and Director of the Triplehorn Insect Collection.

St Patrick’s specimens

Since it is St. Patrick’s day today I felt inspired to search our collections for specimens from Ireland. None of the sound recordings in the Borror lab were made in Ireland – I hope to change this soon as I am planning a trip to Ireland this May. I will keep you updated on which birds I manage to record. May should be prime singing time for most songbirds as they defend their territory and/or attract a mate.

When I searched the Tetrapods collection I came across some bird eggs that sure enough had been collected from nests in Ireland and transported across the Atlantic ocean to be included in our large egg collection. The majority of the 11 egg sets were accessioned when we received the large egg collection put together by Dr. B.R. Bales. He may not have collected all eggs himself, some of the eggs may have been traded with other egg collectors around the world. Such trades were common in former days. The eggs date back to the early 1900s (1899-1923) as you can see from the labels with each one. To my disappointment none were collected on St. Patrick’s day, but I guess March is a bit early for expecting breeding birds in Ireland!

So which species do these Irish eggs belong to? Take a look at the photos.

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Only one species is a songbird, the Dunnock. It builds its nest low in a bush and lays 3-5 blue eggs. Under low light conditions, like inside a bush, these eggs are hard to detect by a potential predator. Keep this in mind when you look at the color and markings of the following eggs of seabirds: The Atlantic Puffin digs a burrow in which it lays its single egg. No color camouflage needed there. Similarly the Manx Shearwater digs a 3-6 feet long burrow in which it lays its single egg. Again the white coloration of the egg is a sign of no camouflage needed. The European Storm Petrel places its nest in crevices between or under rocks, or burrows in the soil. Guess the color of its egg … These eggs are actually from two different females because each lays only a single egg per nesting season. Now look at the egg of the Common Murre, do you think this one is well hidden in a burrow or crevice? The intense markings all over the surface camouflage this egg very well against the bare rock it is laid on. The nest site is on cliff ledges or on flat stony surfaces near water. The last set of eggs is from a single female Corn Crake, a bird in the rail family, which builds its nest in grassland and relies on marking camouflage of its 6-14 eggs per clutch.

Bird eggs, their colors and markings are fascinating and have inspired many research studies. Do you have any burning questions? Leave a comment and we will get back to you.

Have you ever seen any of these birds? The seabirds can be found on both sides of the Atlantic. I have seen Atlantic Puffins on a puffin cruise off the coast of Maine.

About the Author: Angelika Nelson is curator of the Borror Laboratory of Bioacoustics and former curator of the OSU Tetrapods collection.

 

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We Break for Science

A few weeks ago, I highlighted the artistic and scientific variety of illustrations of Metridium senile. These images were on my desk because Metridium is on our minds a lot these days as the focus of the dissertation research of EEOB PhD student Heather Glon. Heather aims to address one of the persistent problems with this widespread and highly variable anemone: whether the name Metridium senile is being used for a constellation of related but distinct species or whether it represents a single, cohesive circumpolar species.

Answering this question requires sampling across the broad range of this species, analyzing DNA from multiple individuals within populations, and comparing morphology and micro-anatomy. Although our partner museums, like the Smithsonian National Museum of Natural History, American Museum of Natural History, and California Academy of Sciences, hold collections that can help solve this puzzle, none of these collections have sampled at the depth we require and the vast majority of the samples in museums are preserved in ways that complicate DNA analysis. With only a few years to amass the data needed for a dissertation, we have no choice but to spend spring break on the road, searching for Metridium along the California coast.

After nearly 10 weeks in classes, this chance to be outside in the field, focusing on research is a welcome change of pace for both me and Heather. The recent rains in California and generally high low tides of the coming week means that we’ll work mostly from floating docks, searching for small pink anemones among the sea squirts, hydroids, and worm tubes coating the floats and pilings. Our travels will take us from Bodega Head to Morro Bay, with detours through Monterey, Half Moon Bay, and Marin. Follow us on Facebook and Instagram, or check back here on Friday for a wrap up of our efforts.

 

OSU Professor Meg DalyAbout the Author: Dr. Meg Daly is Professor in the department of Evolution, Ecology and Organismal Biology, director of the Museum of Biological Diversity and leads the laboratory of marine invertebrate diversity at OSU. She and her students study systematics of cnidaria, sea anemones, jellyfish and their like.

Why describing new species is exciting and important!

For many researchers describing a new species seems like a tedious task. The differences between species might not be obvious, and the language confusing and foreign. This fact became apparent to me when I first presented my work to the Ant Lab at the Museum of Biological Diversity (MBD). As I described subtle differences in morphology, a little spine here and the shape of a hair there, I could tell that I had lost my audience by the dulled looks on my lab mates faces. How could they not see the differences in these two species?

comparison of Trachymyrmex new species and T. zeteki

Fig. 1 – Trachymyrmex new species on the left and T. zeteki on the right

“Some key differentiating characters: The integument is granulose, spatulate bi-colored setae occur between the frontal carina, the scape extends past the occipital corners. This is compared to a weakly irrorate integument, simple bi-colored setae between the frontal carina, and the scape reaching the occipital corners.”

Fig. 2 – In case you are not familiar with the some terms used in describing ant species


Totally clear, right?

While the differences in characters that separate Trachymyrmex new species and T. zeteki, are exciting for me, it seems to bore people to death. After my presentation, I received very helpful constructive criticism from my lab group. They thought it was interesting but a lot of my presentation went over their heads. My advisor, Dr. Rachelle Adams (Assistant Professor in the Department of Evolution, Ecology and Organismal Biology), encouraged me to find a way to turn the jargon into something people can digest and appreciate. I am still working on that, and it is a challenge many researchers face.

Species descriptions are important and a necessary part of daily life

Hopefully your parents told you when you were younger, never eat mushrooms you find in the woods. Taxonomy helps us understand what kind of mushroom you found, if it is edible, or if it might seriously hurt you if you eat it. Mushrooms are a great example of why taxonomy is important. Scientists need to describe and name species so that others can learn which characteristics define a species. Then chemists can tell us which are toxic. This information communicated to the public can potentially save lives! Taxonomists donate representations of species in museums so that they can be compared by other scientists in the future. Aside from publishing their species description, they submit the specimen used to describe the new species, a type specimen. Anyone who works with any type of animal or plant should be submitting voucher specimens, physical specimens that serve as a basis of study, as representatives of their work.

Cody working at microscope

Fig. 2 – Photo courtesy of Plain Janell Photography

My Taxonomic Conundrum

While working on my species description, I reviewed all the literature that included T. zeteki. The 30 papers covered a number of areas such as fungus-growing ant genomes, mating systems, alarm pheromones, larvae development, and gut bacteria. Sadly, almost half of the papers do not mention depositing voucher specimens! Two articles deposited their DNA sequences as vouchers to a database for molecular data. Any research that uses DNA sequences has to submit DNA vouchers to that database; without it your work cannot get published. However, they do not have any physical vouchers linked to their sequences! This lack of physical vouchers was quite a surprise to me. The time I spent as an intern at the MBD Triplehorn Insect Collection, my advisors and other mentors strongly advocated the deposition of vouchers. Without being able to link your DNA sequence to a correctly identified organism, that DNA voucher loses its value. You cannot quickly identify an organism from DNA. Using morphology is the easiest way to do so! It seems many researchers don’t recognize the importance of vouchering and most non-taxonomic journals do not demand it. Research published without vouchers lacks reproducibility, an essential component of the scientific method.

In my research project, I am cleaning up the mess left behind from nearly twenty-years’ worth of poor vouchering and misidentification. I’m not only describing a new species and key characters that differentiate two cryptic species, I am listing all of the papers that have been published in the past twenty years using the names Trachymyrmex zeteki and Trachymyrmex cf. zeteki. By linking the new species description to these articles scientists can move forward knowing the proper identification of these hard-to-identify fungus-growing ants.

The deposition of vouchers should be required for all publications, and is crucial for, past, present, and future research in biology. In my undergraduate research, I discovered there is a disconnect between research museums like the MBD and many scientists. While I am still struggling to turn the technical jargon into information that can be swallowed by non-experts, there are discussions to be had about the importance of taxonomy as a cornerstone in biology.

If you want to learn more about fungus-growing ants and the importance of university research collections, come see us at the MBD Open House April 22, 10am – 4pm.

CodyCardenas, undergraduate student ant lab, EEOBAbout the Author: Cody R. Cardenas is a Senior Undergraduate student in Entomology  working in the Adams Ant Lab.

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Where would you want to work?

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By the way, if the last two posts have inspired you and you are seriously interested in helping with work at the museum, most of the collections are looking for volunteers, please send us an e-mail.

 

About the Author: Angelika Nelson is curator of the Borror Laboratory of Bioacoustics and social media and outreach manager at the Museum of Biological Diversity.