Over på Myrmecos Alex Wild netop bragt til min opmærksomhed en temmelig personligt angreb fra et par republikanske senatorer (Tom Coburn, R-Okla., og John McCain, R-Ariz). Endnu en gang begyndte jeg at kommentere, men i betragtning af hvor tæt på hjemmet dette rammer, Jeg mærkede en længerevarende diatribe nærme sig…
Tilsyneladende, mit job er et kæmpe spild af penge. Finansiering, at California Academy of Sciences (min arbejdsgiver) har modtaget, kommer under direkte angreb. Okay, min position har intet at gøre med Antweb og jeg er ikke understøttet af offentlige midler – men nogle af mine kolleger er. Kolleger, der har præcis samme stillingsbetegnelse som min egen, arbejde et par døre ned, og tilfældigvis til at arbejde på forskellige projekter, der finansieres fra forskellige kilder. Hvad det kan koges ned til, er ikke kun en republikansk krig mod videnskab (gå finde den bog), men en republikansk krig mod intellektualisme. Enhver, hvis skællet lille hånd er udformet denne rapport er ikke kun forsætligt uvidende, men er ved at blive decideret uærlig. Hvad er deres uoplyst større forudsætning her? Den logiske fejlslutning løber et sted langs den linje…
En) Demokrater spilder penge, fordi vi ikke er ved magten.
B) Ved at påpege, hvor disse penge er at blive “spildt” Vi vil hjælpe med at redde den, og til gengæld indynde os til vælgerne.
B) Støtte videnskab (fx. uøkonomiske udgifter) er årsagen til vores økonomiske problemer.
Fresh off the desk of the Nature News is a feature pondering a world without mosquitos (or -toes). How is this news? Perhaps there is some new vector control we all need to hear about! Godt, check out the article from the latest edition of Nature titled “A World Without Mosquitoes“. I originally came across this onPZ Myers blogand started to write a comment… which started to grow exponentially so I decided to blog about it instead.
Okay, måske ikke. Men jeg fik lidt jaloux, da jeg kom på tværs denne artikel hvor jeg opdagede en lokal San Francisco kunstner, der oplades $60 en pop til “insekt sprede klasser”. Jeg spekulerer på, hvor mange virkelig at vise op til den månedlige klasse? Dette blot i, Chris Grinter tilbyder et insekt spreder klasse for blot $49.99! Jeg ville nok gøre det hele sciency selv og ingen ville vise…
Men mens du er ved at lære de måder pinning du kan hente din uhyggelig Victorian udstoppede dyr karakter.
Just about time for another volume of Genius of the Press. Who will be first to spotthe error here? Indrømmet, the information section of the california flat rate moving website is not exactly a source of top notch journalism…
Here are a few more images from my recent northern road trip, this time from western Idaho. Right outside the town of New Meadows were fields of flowers thick with life. It was some of the best day collecting I’ve done in years, and fellow road tripper Peter Jump and I discovered this population ofAdela flammeusella. This represents a likely state record for Idaho and possibly the eastern most population known for this species. They are supposedly associated with Owl’s Clover (some now reassigned toCastilleja), but I don’t recall ever seeing any at this location. I usually notice this plant whenever I’m in the field because it is the host to a handful of other interesting leps.
One frustrating character of the genus Adela is the homogeneity of the genitalia. For any entomologist out there it is par for the course to use the morphology of genitalia as a plethora of characters most useful in species identification. Microleps are often most easily differentiated through dissection, and a few groups must be dissected to even get to genus! But even strikingly different Adela are almost identical internally. I stedet, a leg will go off to get DNA barcoded. Chances are it’s nothing too interesting, but stranger things have been known to happen. At the very least it will be informative to know what the genetic divergence might be across the range of the species.
In eastern Lassen county, on the vast high juniper hills of the California-Nevada border, there are herds of “wild” horses, sheep and cattle. Par for the course, the only flowering plant around was horehound (Marrubium vulgare). Despite the non-native flora and (semi)mega-fauna, the insects were still at home. Being the only nectar source, the small clumps of invasives were packed with thirsty Lycaenidae. In all I netted 6 different species and got some decent shots of 3. It seems like I take a lot of butterfly photos for a moth collector…but it’s hard to pass up such a charismatic group.
But thinking of those horses (ah OK, “mustangs”) has given me a great idea. Ja, horses were once part of the prehistoric American fauna up until about 12,000 år siden. While the horse family may have evolved on the American plains, they have been long absent. Reintroduction of horses by the Spaniards planted the seeds that would become a staple of American culture. That is why today millions of dollars and tens of thousands of feral horses run wild in CA, NV and Utah. Even less popular are the somewhat clandestine annual culls that must be strictly enforced to keep these large herds healthy. My solution: reintroduce lions. America was once home to the North American lion (Panthera leo atrox), which stood a whopping 25% larger than the African lion and was the largest cat to have ever lived. These must have feasted on horse-tacos and in turn kept the populations stable. And since our feral horses are of Arabian dissent, we may as well introduce the extremely endangered Asiatic lion (Panthera leo persica), that will be well suited to feast on its Persian brethren. If we are conserving “wild” horses, we might as well do it right (plus, I’d be much more interested in seeing horses if I could see lions too).
Jeg er ikke så sikker på, om jeg sælges på dette tema. Jeg har shoppet rundt efter et nyt look, og giver “tiogtyve” et forsøg. Lad mig vide din mening – om du synes, det er bedre end det tidligere layout “tåget”, eller hvis der er et andet design, du elsker. Vær ekstra kritisk (især da jeg havde nul at gøre med disse pre-fab design).
Godt – kunne ikke lide det nye tema så meget, gik tilbage til den prøvede og ægte tåge. Jeg kan altid håbe på en fremtidig, der dog passer bedre til denne side.
A few months ago I was out collecting in western Arizona and failed to follow through with any images or updates on that trip. Godt, it was a success and well worth the miles to get there! I was searching for a Crambid moth in the mountains of theKofa National Wildlife Refuge (special thanks to the Kofa staff for quickly approving my permits). While I’m still sorting through moths from that trip, the timing couldn’t have been better weather wise. It was mild out (mid 90’s is almost cool for that region!) and still wet. As you can see below, there were plenty of moths that night. Here are a few images from the trip… now to catch up with my latest photos!
This is as close to the Big Horn Sheep as I could get…
Jeg er tilbage fra vejen med tusindvis af prøver, lidt trætte og klar til at sidde stille for lidt. I alt var det en vidunderlig tur – men jeg har masser og masser af behandling for at gøre. Mens jeg spille catch-up, nyde dette klip. Så vidt jeg ved,, der ikke er nogen direkte forbindelse. But the Grinter pool is a small one and it seems like he should be somewhere on my tree. All I can say is that I hope after I am gone there are ghosts of my creepy employees haunting my home, breathing heavily behind visitors (virkelig? that’s the latest ghost trick?). I also fully expect a documentary with a guy tryingvirkelighard to sound creepy – it should be in my last will and testament.
Over the next week and a half I’ll be driving up to Washington state for the annuallepidopterologer’ Society meeting. It is located in the tourist-trap town of Leavenworth, which is a “Bavarian themed” diorama of postcard and clog shops. While I can never quite understand the appeal of themed towns, it is something Americans just love. For pokker, I lived in Solvang for two years (nedenfor), so Leavenworth will be a nostalgic remembrance.
Now of course I’ll be camping and collecting along the way, so my posting will dip below the already slow norm. I’ll try to post some updates form the road, especially when incredible things happen*. Stay tuned, and enjoy the other spectacular bloggers from my blogroll.
* Which they undoubtedly will. Of course, I know I promised this from my last road trip to Arizona and have yet to deliver. I’m working on it!
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