Wednesday, January 15

Tag: entomologist

What Does The Future of Natural History Museums Look Like?

What Does The Future of Natural History Museums Look Like?

Science and Nature
David Grimaldi stops briefly before a gleaming white cabinet, among lots organized in long rows in a sporadic, high-ceilinged space on the very first flooring of the American Museum of Natural History (AMNH) in New York. With care, Grimaldi pulls a glass-topped box from its rack, exposing row upon row of jewel-bright butterflies pinned to a support board, their yellow and aquamarine colors little dimmed by age. The odor of mothballs wafts from the interior, the ghost of the paradichlorobenzene utilized years ago to keep beetles and other bugs far from the valuable collection."Our collection of butterflies is most likely the best-organized worldwide," states Grimaldi, an entomologist and manager of invertebrate zoology at the AMNH.That's no mean task, thinking about that some 1.3 million bu...
Billions of cicadas will emerge, producing an unique phenomenon

Billions of cicadas will emerge, producing an unique phenomenon

Science and Nature
At some point late this spring, under a cape of darkness, a crowd of bulbous-eyed bugs will emerge from underground, where they've invested the majority of their lives feeding from the sap of tree roots. They will scoot up the very first trees they can discover, leaving their exoskeletons as they molt, shedding old shells as they establish those hallmark wings.The males will quickly start to give off a buzzing sound, before the female bugs join them in a chorus of clicks-- a cacophony of breeding sounds that will swell in a matter of days.This distinct natural symphony will act as an unmissable signal that 2 broods of cicadas have actually emerged from belowground for an uncommon, dually-occurring go back to the world above. "That noise can be so loud," stated Tamra Reall, an entomologist ...